LIBRARY 

OF    THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 


s 


JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

A  BIOGRAPHY 

BY 

HORACE  ELISHA  SCUDDER 
IN  TWO  VOLUMES 

VOL.  n 


:r 


COPYRIGHT,   1901,   BY  HORACE  E.   SCUDDER 

ALL   RIGHTS   RESERVED 
PUBLISHED   NOVEMBER,   IQOI 


1101 

CONTENTS  y  2. 


X.   LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE 

XI.   POETRY  AND  PROSE     ....  74 

XII.   THIRD  JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  .        .  .  151 

XIII.  POLITICS       ......  185 

XIV.  THE  SPANISH  MISSION    .        .        .  .221 
XV.   THE  ENGLISH  MISSION         ...  259 

XVI.   RETURN  TO  PRIVATE  LIFE      .         .  .  322 

XVII.   THE  LAST  YEARS         ....  379 
APPENDIX 

A.  The  Lowell  Ancestry  .....  409 

B.  "List  of  Copies  of  the  Conversations  to  be 

given  away  by  the  *  Don  '  '       .         .         .  419 

C.  A  List  of   the   Writings    of   James    Russell 

Lowell,  arranged  as  nearly  as  may  be  in 
order  of  Publication         .  .         .  421 

D.  The  Lowell  Memorial  in  Westminster  Abbey   448 
INDEX  ......  453 


LIST   OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 


JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL  IN  1882.     Frontispiece 
From  the  painting  by  Mrs.  Anna  Lea  Merritt. 

FACSIMILE  OF  THE  SOWER  .  •     64 

ELMWOOD 

From  a  photograph. 

MB.  LOWELL  IN  HIS  STUDY 
From  a  photograph. 

MRS.  FRANCES  DUNLAP  LOWELL     . 
From  a  crayon  by  S.  W.  Rowse. 

THE  HALL  AT  ELMWOOD    . 
From  a  photograph. 


IV£"SITY 


JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 


CHAPTER   X 
LOWELL   AND   THE   WAR   FOR   THE   UNION 

1858-1865 

WHEN  the  Atlantic  Monthly  was  founded,  its 
conductors  did  not  conceal  their  intention  to  make 
it  a  political  magazine.  It  bore  as  its  sub-head 
a  title  it  has  never  relinquished,  "  A  Magazine 
of  Literature,  Art,  and  Politics."  The  combina 
tion  under  Lowell's  superintendence  did  not  de 
note  that  articles  were  to  be  grouped  under  these 
heads ;  it  intimated  that  in  the  attitude  taken  by 
the  magazine  both  art  and  politics  were  to  be  dis 
cussed  by  men  having  the  literary  faculty,  and  that 
apprehension  of  subjects  which  finds  its  natural 
training  not  exclusively  in  practice  and  affairs  but 
in  acquaintance  with  great  literature  which  is,  after 
all,  the  express  image  of  art  and  politics.  Thus, 
the  magazine  did  not  become,  as  it  might  in  lesser 
hands,  a  mere  propaganda  of  reform,  or  the  organ 
of  a  political  party,  neither  did  it  assume  the  air 
of  philosophical  absenteeism.  If  one  examines  the 
early  numbers  he  is  struck  with  the  preponderance 
of  imaginative  literature  and  of  that  artistic  ele- 


2  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

ment  which  finds  expression  in  historical  narrative 
or  in  the  essay.  The  space  given  to  discussion  of 
affairs  is  not  considerable,  but  evidently  the  sub 
jects  are  chosen  with  deliberation,  and  they  are 
treated  if  not  with  distinction  yet  with  a  good  deal 
more  than  merely  newspaper  care. 

Such  articles  are  found  at  the  latter  end  of  the 
magazine,  a  place  indeed  naturally  adapted  to 
them,  since  in  the  practice  of  printing  opportunity 
would  thus  be  given  for  the  latest  possible  consid 
eration  of  current  events  ;  still,  though  the  latest 
articles  in  the  successive  numbers,  they  were  writ 
ten  at  least  a  month,  and  more  likely  six  weeks  or 
two  months  even  before  they  could  come  into  the 
hands  of  readers,  so  that  the  authors  were  com 
pelled  to  see  things  in  the  large  far  more  than 
writers  who  might  change  their  judgments  over 
night  on  the  receipt  of  a  telegram. 

These  articles,  corresponding,  as  far  as  a  monthly 
could  parallel  a  daily,  to  the  leader  of  a  journal, 
were  usually  one  to  a  number.  In  the  November, 
1857,  Atlantic,  the  first  to  be  issued,  was  "  The 
Financial  Flurry,"  by  Mr.  Parke  Godwin,  who  had 
been  an  important  writer  on  the  staff  of  Putnam's 
Monthly.  In  December  appeared  "  Where  will 
it  End  ? "  by  Edmund  Quincy,  an  enquiry  into 
the  outcome  of  slavery  in  America,  somewhat  in 
the  nature  of  that  gentleman's  contributions  to  the 
Anti- Slavery  Standard,  when  he  and  Lowell  were 
associated  there,  though  somewhat  more  moderate 
in  manner.  It  was  vigorous,  pointed,  and  a  reason 
able  summary  of  the  situation  politically,  but  it 


LOWELL  AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    3 

was  an  appeal  to  fundamental  principles,  not  to 
temporary  political  conditions.  In  January  Mr. 
Godwin  again  wrote  the  political  leader,  this  time 
on  "  The  President's  Message,"  which  had  been  de 
livered  by  Mr.  Buchanan  at  the  coming  together 
of  Congress  early  in  December,  and  the  paper 
could  therefore  be  regarded  as  a  prompt  consider 
ation  of  the  policy  of  the  new  administration.  The 
article  was  brief  and  passed  in  review  the  three 
main  topics  of  the  currency,  our  foreign  relations, 
and  the  Kansas-Nebraska  difficulties.  In  Febru 
ary  Mr.  Godwin  took  up  more  in  detail  an  exami 
nation  of  the  Kansas  Usurpation ;  there  was  no 
political  article  in  March,  but  in  April  Lowell  took 
a  hand  in  a  characteristic  fashion. 

Mr.  Buchanan  had  been  in  office  a  year,  and  the 
momentous  hour  was  approaching  when  the  forces 
for  and  against  the  Union,  with  all  that  the  Union 
stood  for  in  the  progress  of  freedom,  were  to  be 
marshalled.  The  preliminary  test  of  strength  was 
already  offered  in  Kansas,  and  the  moral  and  intel 
lectual  debate  was  apparent  in  Washington.  The 
principles  for  which  the  Atlantic  stood  were  those 
for  which  the  Anti-  Slavery  Standard  had  stood 
ten  years  before,  but  Lowell  was  now  on  a  broader 
platform,  since  the  Atlantic  represented  freedom, 
history,  law,  and  civilization,  where  the  Standard 
had  represented  the  attack  upon  a  pernicious  sys 
tem.  Mr.  Godwin  was  again  called  on  to  review 
the  first  year  of  the  Buchanan  administration, 
which  he  did  in  an  article  of  about  eight  Atlantic 
pages,  with  the  caption  "  Mr.  Buchanan's  Admin- 


4  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

istration."  The  review  was  methodical  and  severe. 
It  examined  the  record  upon  four  leading  points, 
the  Mormon  question,  the  Financial  question,  the 
Filibuster  question,  and  the  Kansas  question.  Mr. 
Godwin,  a  trained  journalist  of  the  older  school,  a 
man  of  resources  in  reading  and  scholarship,  and 
a  vigorous  thinker,  handled  his  subject  with  skill 
and  analyzed  the  situation  with  clearness,  giving 
the  results  in  an  incisive  manner.  The  article  ac 
complished  what  it  set  out  to  do,  and  is  a  capital 
example  of  a  shrewd,  forcible  political  leader. 

Then  Lowell  took  up  the  parable,  and  it  is 
hardly  likely  that  any  observant  reader  of  the 
April  Atlantic  failed  to  note  that  in  stepping  over 
the  white  line  wjiich  separated  the  first  eight  from 
the  latter  six  pages  of  the  article,  he  had  passed 
from  the  domain  of  one  writer  to  that  of  another. 
It  is  quite  as  likely  that,  however  he  may  have  been 
impressed  with  the  good  sense  and  virility  of  the 
former  part  of  the  article,  he  was  not  so  piqued  by 
curiosity  to  know  who  wrote  it,  as  he  was  in  the 
case  of  the  latter  part,  for  that  portion  is  instinct 
with  a  vivid  personal  note.  If  the  reader  of  that 
day  were  familiar  with  Lowell's  political  writings 
of  ten  years  before,  he  would  not  fail  to  attribute 
these  pages  to  the  editor  of  the  magazine.  The 
same  note  is  struck  in  each,  though  the  insouciance 
of  wit  is  somewhat  hidden  by  a  fiery  earnestness 
there,  as  if  the  author  could  not  stop  to  play  by  the 
way,  as  he  was  wont  to  do  when  the  political  thun 
der-clouds  were  not  gathering  so  ominously  in  the 
west. 


LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    5 

Lowell  did  not  preserve  his  share  of  the  article 
among  his  "  Political  Essays,"  and  this  is  not 
strange,  not  only  because  his  writing  was  a  detach 
ment  of  a  fuller  article,  but  because  with  all  its 
undoubted  eloquence  it  was  not  so  careful  and 
rounded  a  piece  of  work  as  his  later  essays  in  the 
same  field.  In  the  absence  of  any  correspondence 
on  the  subject,  it  is  reasonable  to  conjecture  that, 
having  received  Mr.  Godwin's  article  and  assigned 
it  to  the  number,  he  was  constrained  to  think  that 
forcible  as  it  was  in  its  indictment  of  Mr.  Buch 
anan's  administration  for  errors  and  blunders,  it 
might  well  afford  the  starting-point  for  a  further 
arraignment,  not  of  the  administration  in  particu 
lar  but  of  the  nation  itself  so  far  as  that  was  parti- 
ceps  criminis  with  the  administration  in  its  role 
of  attorney  for  the  slave-power. 

But  any  such  indictment  as  this  must  be  drawn 
under  the  provisions  of  the  moral  law  and  find  its 
precedents  in  history,  and  make  its  appeal  to  the 
conscience  of  the  people  as  the  final  court.  Into 
this  business,  therefore,  Lowell  threw  himself  with 
vehemence.  He  knew  his  own  country's  history, 
he  knew  also  the  history  of  man  ;  and  the  moral 
ardor,  the  almost  prophetic  power  which  had  been 
both  his  inheritance,  and  the  characteristic  of  his 
early  manhood  when  he  was  almost  persuaded  to  be 
a  Reformer,  now  flamed  out.  It  was  as  if  he  had 
been  storing  energy  during  the  ten  years  of  com 
parative  silence  since  the  issue  of  the  "  Biglow 
Papers  "  and  the  contributions  to  the  Standard. 

"  Looking  at  the  administration  of  Mr.  Buch- 


6  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

anan,"  he  begins,  "  from  the  point  of  view  of  en 
lightened  statesmanship "  (which  was  Mr.  God 
win's),  "we  find  nothing  in  it  that  is  not  con- 
iemptible  ;  but  when  we  regard  it  as  the  accredited 
exponent  of  the  moral  sense  of  a  majority  of  our 
people,  it  is  saved  from  contempt,  indeed,  but  saved 
only  because  contempt  is  merged  in  a  deeper  feel 
ing  of  humiliation  and  apprehension.  Unparal- 
lelled  as  the  outrages  in  Kansas  have  been,  we 
regard  them  as  insignificant  in  comparison  with  the 
deadlier  fact  that  the  Chief  Magistrate  of  the  Ee- 
public  should  strive  to  defend  them  by  the  small 
wiles  of  a  village  attorney,  —  that,  when  the  honor 
of  a  nation  and  the  principle  of  self-government  are 
at  stake,  he  should  show  himself  unconscious  of 
a  higher  judicature  or  a  nobler  style  of  -pleading 
than  those  which  would  serve  for  a  case  of  petty 
larceny,  —  and  that  he  should  be  abetted  by  more 
than  half  the  national  representatives,  while  he 
brings  down  a  case  of  public  conscience  to  the 
moral  level  of  those  who  are  content  with  the  mac 
ulate  safety  which  they  owe  to  a  flaw  in  an  indict 
ment,  or  with  the  dingy  innocence  which  is  certified 
to  by  the  disagreement  of  a  jury." 

Regarding  this  as  a  logical  consequence  of  the 
profound  national  demoralization  which  followed 
the  enactment  of  the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill,  and 
warming  to  his  subject  as  he  rehearses  that  de 
plorable  business,  he  clears  the  way  for  his  first 
proposition,  by  which  he  aims  to  lift  the  discussion 
into  the  higher  air  of  history  and  elemental  moral 
ity.  "  The  capacity  of  the  English  race  for  self- 


LOWELL  AND   THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION     7 

government,"  he  proceeds,  "  is  measured  by  their 
regard  as  well  for  the  forms  as  the  essence  of  law. 
A  race  conservative  beyond  all  others  of  what  is 
established,  averse  beyond  all  others  to  the  heroic 
remedy  of  forcible  revolution,  they  have  yet  three 
times  in  the  space  of  a  century  and  a  half  assumed 
the  chances  of  rebellion  and  the  certain  perils  of 
civil  war,  rather  than  submit  to  have  Eight  in 
fringed  by  Prerogative,  and  the  scales  of  Justice 
made  a  cheat  by  false  weights  that  kept  the  shape 
but  lacked  the  substance  of  legitimate  precedent. 
We  are  forced  to  think  that  there  must  be  a  bend 
sinister  in  the  escutcheon  of  the  descendants  of 
such  men,  when  we  find  them  setting  the  form 
above  the  substance,  and  accepting  as  law  that 
which  is  deadly  to  the  spirit  while  it  is  true  to  the 
letter  of  legality.  It  is  a  spectacle  portentous  of 
moral  lapse  and  social  disorganization,  to  see  a 
statesman,  who  has  had  fifty  years'  experience  of 
American  politics,  quibbling  in  defence  of  Execu 
tive  violence  against  a  free  community,  as  if  the 
conscience  of  the  nation  were  no  more  august  a 
tribunal  than  a  police  justice  sitting  upon  a  paltry 
case  of  assault.  .  .  .  There  is  a  Fate  which  spins 
and  cuts  the  threads  of  national  as  of  individual 
life,  and  the  case  of  God  against  the  people  of 
these  United  States  is  not  to  be  debated  before  any 
such  petty  tribunal  as  Mr.  Buchanan  and  his  ad 
visers  seem  to  suppose." 

The  difficulty,  Lowell  sees,  is  in  the  lack  of  any 
organized  public  sentiment,  and  thus  in  the  weak 
ness  of  the  sense  of  responsibility.  "  The  guilt  of 


8  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

every  national  sin  comes  back  to  the  voter  in  a 
fraction,  the  denominator  of  which  is  several  mil 
lions,"  and  the  need  is  of  a  thorough  awakening  of 
the  individual  conscience.  It  is  the  moral  aspect 
of  the  great  question  before  the  country  which  is 
cardinal,  yet  the  moral  must  go  hand  in  hand  with 
common  sense,  and  Lowell  contrasts  the  solidarity 
of  the  South,  created  by  the  gravitation  of  private 
interest,  with  the  perpetual  bickering  of  the  North 
ern  enemies  of  slavery  amongst  themselves.  He 
calls  for  less  scrutiny  of  the  character  of  the  allies 
the  anti-slavery  people  draw  to  themselves,  and 
more  political  forethought  and  practical  sense. 
"  The  advantage  of  our  opponents  has  been  that 
they  have  always  had  some  sharp  practical  mea 
sure,  some  definite  and  immediate  object,  to  oppose 
to  our  voluminous  propositions  of  abstract  right. 
Again  and  again  the  whirlwind  of  oratorical  enthu 
siasm  has  roused  and  heaped  up  the  threatening 
masses  of  the  Free  States,  and  again  and  again  we 
have  seen  them  collapse  like  a  waterspout  into  a 
crumbling  heap  of  disintegrated  bubbles  before  the 
compact  bullet  of  political  audacity.1  While  our 
legislatures  have  been  resolving  and  re-resolving 
the  principles  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence, 
our  adversaries  have  pushed  their  trenches,  parallel 
after  parallel,  against  the  very  citadel  of  our  politi 
cal  equality." 

Hence  he  calls  for  an  offensive  attitude  on  the 
part  of  the  lovers  of  freedom.  "  Are  we  to  be  ter 
rified  any  longer,"  he  asks,  "by  such  Chinese 

1  "  Take  up  arms  against  a  sea  of  troubles." 


LOWELL  AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    9 

devices  of  warfare  as  the  cry  of  Disunion,  —  a 
threat  as  hollow  as  the  mask  from  which  it  issues, 
as  harmless  as  the  periodical  suicides  of  Mantalini, 
as  insincere  as  the  spoiled  child's  refusal  of  his 
supper  ?  We  have  no  desire  for  a  dissolution  of 
our  confederacy,  though  it  is  not  for  us  to  fear  / 
it.  We  will  not  allow  it :  we  will  not  permit  the  J 
Southern  half  of  our  dominion  to  become  a  Hayti. 
But  there  is  no  danger ;  the  law  that  binds  our 
system  of  confederate  stars  together  is  of  stronger 
fibre  than  to  be  snapped  by  the  trembling  finger  of 
Toombs  or  cut  by  the  bloodless  sword  of  Davis  ; 
the  march  of  the  Universe  is  not  to  be  stayed  be 
cause  some  gentleman  in  Buncombe  declares  that 
his  sweet-potato  patch  shall  not  go  along  with  it. 
The  sweet  attraction  which  knits  the  sons  of  Vir 
ginia  to  the  Treasury  has  lost  none  of  its  control 
ling  force.  We  must  make  up  our  minds  to  keep 
these  deep-descended  gentlemen  in  the  Union,  and 
must  convince  them  that  we  have  a  work  to  accom 
plish  in  it  and  by  means  of  it.  If  our  Southern 
brethren  have  the  curse  of  Canaan  in  their  pious 
keeping,  if  the  responsibility  lie  upon  them  to 
avenge  the  insults  of  Noah,  011  us  devolves  a  more 
comprehensive  obligation  and  the  vindication  of  an 
elder  doom  ;  —  it  is  for  us  to  assert  and  to  secure 
the  claim  of  every  son  of  Adam  to  the  common 
inheritance  ratified  by  the  sentence,  '  In  the  sweat 
of  thy  brow  shalt  thou  earn  thy  bread.'  We  are 
to  establish  no  aristocracy  of  race  or  complexion, 
no  caste  which  nature  and  Revelation  alike  refuse 
to  recognize,  but  the  indefeasible  right  of  man  to 


10  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  soil  which  he  subdues,  and  the  muscles  with 
which  he  subdues  it.  If  this  be  a  sectional  creed, 
it  is  a  sectionality  which  at  least  includes  three 
hundred  and  fifty-nine  degrees  of  the  circle  of 
man's  political  aspiration  and  physical  activity,  and 
we  may  as  well  be  easy  under  the  imputation." 

The  contempt  wjth^jwliicluJLowell  treats  the 
renewed  threats  of  secession,  illustrates  the  blind 
ness  which  he  shared  with  most  of  "Iris  friends,  and 
it  is  not  likely  that  in  after  years  he  would  have 
been  so  confident  that  the  South  had  no  higher 
principles  mingled  with  the  baser  ones  of  love  of 
prosperity  and  power.  The  "  bloodless  sword " 
of  Davis  also  gave  way  in  his  phrase  to  the  "  drip- 
pin'  red  haii',''  and  the  deep  gravity  of  war  caused 
him  to  strike  profounder  notes.  But  it  is  not  easy 
for  men  of  this  generation  to  realize  the  galling 
sense  of  humiliation  which  the  men  of  Lowell's  day 
felt  at  the  manner  in  which  the  general  govern 
ment  was  made  subservient  to  the  demands  of  the 
slave  power.  So  conscious  were  they  of  the  steady 
degeneration  of  the  political  sense,  that  they  were 
scarcely  aware  of  the  counter  force  of  the  rising 
tide  of  anti-slavery  and  union  sentiment,  so  that 
the  great  wave  which  swept  over  the  North  after 
the  attack  upon  Sumter  came  with  almost  as  much 
a  surprise  to  them  as  to  the  South. 

It  is  in  confession  of  this  political  degeneracy 
that  the  article  proceeds,  and  Lowell  lashes  his 
countrymen  with  scorn  for  it,  but  he  refuses  to 
believe  that  this  is  to  be  the  fate  of  the  republic. 
"  When  we  look  back  upon  the  providential  series 


LOWELL  AND  THE   WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    11 

of  events  which  prepared  this  continent  for  the  ex 
periment  of  Democracy,  —  when  we  think  of  those 
forefathers  for  whom  our  mother  England  shed 
down  from  her  august  breasts  the  nutriment  of 
ordered  liberty,  not  unmixed  with  her  best  blood 
in  the  day  of  her  trial, —  when  we  remember  the 
first  two  acts  of  our  drama,  that  cost  one  king  his 
head  and  his  son  a  throne,  and  that  third  which 
cost  another  the  fairest  appanage  of  his  crown  and 
gave  a  new  Hero  to  mankind,  —  we  cannot  believe 
it  possible  that  this  great  scene,  stretching  from 
ocean  to  ocean,  was  prepared  by  the  Almighty  only 
for  such  men  as  Mr.  Buchanan  and  his  peers  to 
show  their  feats  of  juggling  on,  even  though  the 
thimble-rig  be  on  so  colossal  a  scale  that  the  stake 
is  a  territory  larger  than  Britain.  We  cannot 
believe  that  this  unhistoried  continent,  —  this  vir 
gin  leaf  in  the  great  diary  of  man's  conquest  over 
the  planet,  on  which  our  fathers  wrote  two  words 
of  epic  grandeur,  —  Plymouth  and  Bunker  Hill,  — 
is  to  bear  for  its  colophon  the  record  of  men  who 
inherited  greatness  and  left  it  pusillanimity,  —  a 
republic,  and  made  it  anarchy,  —  freedom,  and  were 
content  as  serfs,  —  of  men  who,  born  to  the  noblest 
estate  of  grand  ideas  and  fair  expectancies  the 
world  had  ever  seen,  bequeathed  the  sordid  price 
of  them  in  gold.  The  change  is  sad  'twixt  now  and 
then ;  the  Great  Republic  is  without  influence  in 
the  councils  of  the  world  ;  to  be  an  American,  in 
Europe,  is  to  be  the  accomplice  of  filibusters  and 
slave-traders  ;  instead  of  men  and  thought,  as  was 
hoped  of  us,  we  send  to  the  Old  World  cotton,  corn, 


12  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

and  tobacco,  and  are  but  as  one  of  her  outlying 
farms.  Are  we  basely  content  with  our  pecuniary 
good-fortune  ?  Do  we  look  on  the  tall  column  of 
figures  on  the  credit  side  of  our  national  ledger  as 
a  sufficing  monument  of  our  glory  as  a  people  ? 
Are  we  of  the  North  better  off  as  provinces  of  the 
Slave-holding  States  than  as  colonies  of  Great 
Britain?  Are  we  content  with  our  share  in  the 
administration  of  national  affairs,  because  we  are 
to  have  the  ministry  to  Austria,  and  because  the 
newspapers  promise  that  James  Gordon  Bennett 
shall  be  sent  out  of  the  country  to  fill  it?" 

The  subordination  of  the  Free  States  in  the  ad 
ministration  of  the  government  is  traced  to  the 
moral  disintegration  which  has  set  in,  and  after  a 
recital  in  incisive  terms  of  the  act  in  subversion  of 
true  democracy  which  they  have  been  compelled  to 
witness,  he  closes  with  this  appeal :  "  It  lies  in  the 
hands  of  the  people  of  the  Free  States  to  rescue 
themselves  and  the  country  by  peaceable  reform, 
ere  it  be  too  late,  and  there  be  no  remedy  left  but 
that  dangerous  one  of  revolution,  toward  which 
Mr.  Buchanan  and  his  advisers  seem  bent  on  driv 
ing  them.  .  .  .  Prosperity  has  deadened  and  be 
wildered  us.  It  is  time  we  remembered  that  His 
tory  does  not  concern  herself  about  material  wealth, 
—  that  the  life-blood  of  a  nation  is  not  that  yellow 
tide  which  fluctuates  in  the  arteries  of  Trade,  — 
that  its  true  revenues  are  religion,  justice,  sobriety, 
magnanimity,  and  the  fair  amenities  of  Art,  —  that 
it  is  only  by  the  soul  that  any  people  has  achieved 
greatness  and  made  lasting  conquests  over  the 


LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    13 

future.  We  believe  there  is  virtue  enough  left  in 
the  North  and  West  to  infuse  health  into  our  body 
politic ;  we  believe  that  America  will  reassume  that 
moral  influence  among  the  nations  which  she  has 
allowed  to  fall  into  abeyance ;  and  that  our  eagle, 
whose  morning-flight  the  world  watched  with  hope 
and  expectation,  shall  no  longer  troop  with  unclean 
buzzards,  but  rouse  himself  and  seek  his  eyrie  to 
brood  new  eaglets  that  in  time  shall  share  with 
him  the  lordship  of  these  Western  heavens,  and 
shall  learn  of  him  to  shake  the  thunder  from  their 
invincible  wings." 

The  merits  and  the  defects  of  Lowell's  political 
writings  appear  in  this  article.  There  is  the  divi 
nation  of  the  real  question,  the  reference  to  moral 
principles,  and  the  witty  phrase  ;  but  also  there  is 
that  sort  of  coruscation  of  language  which  tends  to 
conceal  point  and  application.  The  writing  is  that 
of  a  good  talker  rather  than  of  a  good  pleader. 
The  very  breadth  of  the  play  of  mind  in  Lowell 
militated  against  directness  of  attack.  He  finds 
the  seat  of  the  difficulty  not  in  this  or  that  politi 
cal  blunder,  but  in  a  disintegration  of  the  public 
conscience  which  had  long  been  going  on,  and  he 
sees  no  remedy  for  this  but  in  the  arousing  of 
the  individual  responsibility.  It  is  the  voice  of 
the  preacher,  and  even  so  not  of  the  crusading 
preacher. 

He  was  more  in  his  own  field  when  writing  the 
article  on  "  The  American  Tract  Society,"  since 
here  his  wit  and  satire  were  engaged  on  a  theme 
where  fundamental  morals  and  expediency  were  afc 


14  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

issue,  and  two  articles  which  followed  on  Rufus 
Choate  and  Caleb  Gushing1  had  the  incisiveness 
of  brilliant  newspaper  work,  and  a  breadth  not  to 
be  looked  for  in  a  newspaper.  "  Phillips  [the 
publisher]  was  so  persuaded,"  he  writes  to  Mr. 
Norton  after  the  first  had  appeared,  "  of  the  stand 
given  to  the  magazine  by  the  Choate  article  that  he 
has  been  at  me  ever  since  for  another.  So  I  have 
written  a  still  longer  one  on  Gushing.  I  think  you 
will  like  it  —  though,  on  looking  over  the  Choate 
article  this  morning,  I  am  inclined  to  think  that 
on  the  whole  the  better  of  the  two.  Better  as  a 
whole,  I  mean,  for  there  are  passages  in  this  be 
yond  any  in  that,  I  think.  These  personal  things 
are  not  such  as  I  should  choose  to  do,  for  they 
subject  me  to  all  manner  of  vituperation ;  but  one 
must  take  what  immediate  texts  the  newspapers 
afford  him,  and  I  accepted  the  responsibility  in 
accepting  my  post." 

It  must  be  remembered  that  these  articles  were 
written  two  or  three  years  before  the  great  crisis 
was  reached,  and  when  in  the  minds  of  nearly  all 
public  men  the  question  was  one  of  everlasting 
debate,  not  yet  of  action,  except  so  far  as  the  de 
bate  found  concrete  expression  in  the  struggle  for 
possession  in  Kansas.  In  writing  these  personal 
papers  Lowell  therefore  was  using  his  scorn  and 
satire  in  defence  of  the  political  idealists  of  whom 
he  was  one,  and  in  attack  of  the  political  trimmers 

1  "  The  Pocket  Celebration  of  the  Fourth,"  in  the  Atlantic  for 
August,  1858,  and  "  A  Sample  of  Consistency,"  in  the  same  for 
November,  1858. 


LOWELL  AND   THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    15 

of  whom  he  took  Choate  and  Gushing  as  represent 
atives.  Yet  even  in  these  papers  he  recurs  again 
and  again  to  those  fundamental  political  questions 
which  underlie  all  notions  of  persons  and  parties. 
This  is  especially  evident  in  the  conclusion  of  the 
article  on  Caleb  Gushing. 

"The  ethical  aspects  of  slavery,"  he  contends, 
"  are  not  and  cannot  be  the  subject  of  considera 
tion  with  any  party  which  proposes  to  act  under 
the  Constitution  of  the  United  States.  Nor  are 
they  called  upon  to  consider  its  ethnological  aspect. 
Their  concern  with  it  is  confined  to  the  domain  of 
politics,  and  they  are  not  called  to  the  discussion 
of  abstract  principles,  but  of  practical  measures. 
The  question,  even  in  its  political  aspect,  is  one 
which  goes  to  the  very  foundation  of  our  theories 
and  our  institutions.  It  is  simply,  shall  the  course 
of  the  Republic  be  so  directed  as  to  subserve  the 
interests  of  aristocracy  or  of  democracy?  Shall 
our  territories  be  occupied  by  lord  and  serf  or  by 
intelligent  freemen  ?  by  laborers  who  are  owned, 
or  by  men  who  own  themselves  ?  The  Republican 
party  has  no  need  of  appealing  to  prejudice  or 
passion.  In  this  case  there  is  a  meaning  in  the 
phrase,  '  Manifest  Destiny.'  America  is  to  be  the 
land  of  the  workers,  the  country  where,  of  all 
others,  the  intelligent  brain  and  skilled  hand  of 
the  mechanic,  and  the  patient  labor  of  those  who 
till  their  own  fields,  are  to  stand  them  in  greatest 
stead.  We  are  to  inaugurate  and  carry  on  the 
new  system  which  makes  Man  of  more  value  than 
Property,  which  will  one  day  put  the  living  value 


16  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

of  industry  above  the  dead  value  of  capital.  Our 
republic  was  not  born  under  Cancer,  to  go  back 
ward.  Perhaps  we  do  not  like  the  prospect?  Per 
haps  we  love  the  picturesque  charm  with  which 
novelists  and  poets  have  invested  the  old  feudal 
order  of  things  ?  That  is  not  the  question.  This 
New  World  of  ours  is  to  be  the  world  of  great 
workers  and  small  estates.  The  freemen  whose 
capital  is  their  two  hands  must  inevitably  become 
hostile  to  a  system  clumsy  and  barbarous  like  that 
of  Slavery,  which  only  carries  to  its  last  result  the 
pitiless  logic  of  selfishness,  sure  at  last  to  subject 
the  toil  of  the  many  to  the  irresponsible  power  of 
the  few." 

In  these  papers  Lowell  again  separated  himself 
instinctively  from  the  extreme  Abolitionists,  the 
men,  that  is,  who  concentrated  their  attention  exclu 
sively  upon  the  sin  of  slavery,  and  refused  to  use 
any  political  weapons  for  the  overthrow  of  the  sys 
tem.  He  did  not  delay  much  over  the  economic 
aspects  of  the  matter,  but  based  his  attacks  almost 
wholly  upon  the  eternal  principles  of  Freedom.  It 
was  for  Freedom,  almost  as  a  personal  figure,  that 
he  had  been  a  free  lance  from  his  youth,  and  he 
had  come  in  his  manhood  to  identify  freedom  with 
his  country  till  he  had  a  passionate  jealousy  for 
the  fair  name  of  the  nation.  He  was  not  blind  to 
the  inconsistency  which  slavery  created,  but  he  re 
fused  to  accept  slavery  as  a  permanent  condition, 
and  was  strenuous  in  his  belief  that  the  fundamental, 
historical,  and  prophetic  life  of  the  nation  was  ag 
gressively  free,  and  made  for  freedom. 


LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    17 

Hence  lie  identified  himself  with  the  Republican 
party,  in  its  early  days,  with  cheerful  alacrity,  sup 
porting  it  by  his  pen  and  his  vote,  and  hence,  also, 
as  the  lines  were  drawn  more  closely  at  the  time  of 
the  election  of  Mr.  Lincoln,  his  political  articles 
in  the  Atlantic  became  more  direct  and  more 
charged  with  a  statesmanlike  rather  than  with  a 
merely  opportune  character.  In  October,  1860,  he 
printed  a  paper  on  "  The  Election  in  November," 
which  is  preserved  in  his  "  Political  Essays."  It 
is  a  survey  of  the  field  on  the  eve  of  the  great 
election,  in  which  he  aims  to  present  the  issue 
clearly.  He  finds  it  in  the  death  struggle  of  the 
slaveholding  interest,  which  has  so  long  dominated 
national  politics,  but  it  is  to  him  not  a  question  of 
political  preponderancy,  but  of  the  moral  integrity 
of  the  non-slaveholding  States.  "  We  believe,"  he 
says,  "  that  this  election  is  a  turning-point  in  our 
history  ;  for,  although  there  are  four  candidates, 
there  are  really,  as  everybody  knows,  but  two  parties, 
and  a  single  question  that  divides  them.  .  .  .  The 
cardinal  question  on  which  the  whole  policy  of  the 
country  is  to  turn  —  a  question,  too,  which  this  very 
election  must  decide  in  one  way  or  the  other  —  is 
the  interpretation  to  be  put  upon  certain  clauses 
of  the  Constitution."  After  a  witty  analysis  of 
the  parties  which  trade  most  in  the  term  "  con 
servative,"  he  makes  a  keen  inquiry  into  the  basis 
of  Southern  civilization,  with  the  purpose  of  con 
sidering  what  degree  of  permanence  there  is  in  the 
society  which  rests  on  it,  and  reaches  the  conclu 
sion  that  "  in  such  communities  the  seeds  of  an 


18  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

'  irrepressible  conflict '  are  surely,  if  slowly,  ripen 
ing,  and  signs  are  daily  multiplying  that  the  true 
peril  to  their  social  organization  is  looked  for,  less 
in  a  revolt  of  the  owned  labor  than  in  an  insurrec 
tion  of  intelligence  in  the  labor  that  owns  itself 
and  finds  itself  none  the  richer  for  it.  To  multiply 
such  communities  is  to  multiply  weakness.  The 
election  in  November  turns  on  the  single  and  sim 
ple  question,  Whether  we  shall  consent  to  the  in 
definite  multiplication  of  them  ;  and  the  only  party 
which  stands  plainly  and  unequivocally  pledged 
against  such  a  policy,  riay,  which  is  not  either 
openly  or  impliedly  in  favor  of  it,  —  is  the  Repub 
lican  party." 

It  is  interesting  to  note  that  Lowell  frankly 
expresses  in  this  article  his  regret  that  Lincoln 
instead  of  Seward  should  have  been  selected  as 
candidate  for  the  presidency.  He  saw  in  Seward  a 
reasonable  and  persistent  exponent  of  the  cardinal 
doctrines  of  the  party,  and  hence  he  wished  him  at 
the  front  as  the  most  conspicuous  representative. 
"  It  was  assumed  that  his  nomination  would  have 
embittered  the  contest,  and  tainted  the  Republican 
creed  with  radicalism ;  but  we  doubt  it.  We  can 
not  think  that  a  party  gains  by  not  hitting  its 
hardest,  or  by  sugaring  its  opinions.  Republican 
ism  is  not  a  conspiracy  to  obtain  office  under  false 
pretences.  It  has  a  definite  aim,  an  earnest  pur 
pose,  and  the  unflinching  tenacity  of  profound 
conviction."  Evidently  he  had  not  yet,  as  very 
few  at  the  East  had,  made  the  acquaintance  of  Mr. 
Lincoln,  but  he  accepts  the  nomination  with  con- 


LOWELL  AND  THE   WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    19 

fidence.  "  Mr.  Lincoln,"  he  says,  "has  proved 
both  his  ability  and  his  integrity ;  he  has  had 
experience  enough  in  public  affairs  to  make  him 
a  statesman,  and  not  enough  to  make  him  a  politi 
cian.  .  .  .  He  represents  a  party  who  know  that 
true  policy  is  gradual  in  its  advances,  that  it  is 
conditional  and  not  absolute,  that  it  must  deal  with 
facts  and  not  with  sentiments,  but  who  know  also 
that  it  is  wiser  to  stamp  out  evil  in  the  spark  than 
to  wait  till  there  is  no  help  but  in  fighting  fire 
with  fire.  They  are  the  only  conservative  party, 
because  they  are  the  only  one  that  is  not  willing 
to  pawn  to-morrow  for  the  means  to  gamble  with 
to-day.  They  have  no  hostility  to  the  South,  but 
a  determined  one  to  doctrines  of  whose  ruinous 
tendency  every  day  more  and  more  convinces  them." 
And  again  he  emphatically  declares  of  the  members 
of  the  party  which  he  believes  about  to  triumph  at 
the  polls  :  "  They  believe  that  slavery  is  a  wrong 
morally,  a  mistake  politically,  and  a  misfortune 
practically,  wherever  it  exists  ;  that  it  has  nullified 
our  influence  abroad  and  forced  us  to  compromise 
with  our  better  instincts  at  home ;  that  it  has  per- 
verted  our  government  from  its  legitimate  objects, 
weakened  the  respect  for  the  laws  by  making  them 
the  tools  of  its  purposes,  and  sapped  the  faith  of 
men  in  any  higher  political  morality  than  interest 
or  any  better  statesmanship  than  chicane.  They 
mean  in  every  lawful  way  to  hem  it  within  its 
present  limits." 

Lowell  confessed  in  a  letter  to  Mr.  Nordhoff,1 
1  Letters,  i.  307-309. 


20  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

written  a  few  weeks  after  the  election,  when  it  will 
be  remembered  there  was  very  little  evidence  to 
show  that  the  Kepublican  party  had  not  recoiled 
from  its  own  success,  that  he  was  greatly  puzzled 
to  gauge  the  actual  mind  of  the  public.  "  But  one 
thing  seems  to  me  clear,"  he  says,  "  that  we  have 
been  running  long  enough  by  dead  reckoning,  and 
that  it  is  time  to  take  the  height  of  the  sun  of 
righteousness."  It  was  the  time  of  Buchanan's 
attitude  of  helplessness,  the  logical  result  of  a  life 
spent  in  adjustment  of  principle  to  occasion.  "  Is 
it  the  effect  of  democracy,"  Lowell  asks,  "  to  make 
all  our  public  men  cowards  ?  An  ounce  of  pluck 
just  now  were  worth  a  king's  ransom.  There  is 
one  comfort,  though  a  shabby  one,  in  the  feeling 
that  matters  will  come  to  such  a  pass  that  courage 
will  be  forced  upon  us,  and  that  when  there  is  no 
hope  left  we  shall  learn  a  little  self-confidence  from 
despair.  That  in  such  a  crisis  the  fate  of  the  coun 
try  should  be  in  the  hands  of  a  sneak !  If  the 
Republicans  stand  firm  we  shall  be  saved,  even  at 
the  cost  of  disunion.  If  they  yield,  it  is  all  up 
with  us  and  with  the  experiment  of  democracy." 

When  he  wrote  this  letter,  he  had  already  writ 
ten  and  indeed  printed  his  paper  on  "  The  Ques 
tion  of  the  Hour  "  in  the  Atlantic  for  January, 
1861.  However  apparently  inert  and  even  dazed 
the  North  might  be,  and  however  paralyzed  the 
federal  government,  there  was  little  indecision  at 
the  South.  South  Carolina  had  already  taken 
steps  to  "  withdraw  from  the  Union,"  and  the 
Southern  public  men  were  in  a  high  state  of  activ- 


LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    21 

ity.  In  this  article,  which  has  not  been  reprinted, 
Lowell  considers  briefly  the  possibility  of  disunion 
through  the  action  of  the  South.  He  is  somewhat 
incredulous  of  the  imminence  of  this  danger,  and 
the  real  question  of  the  hour  to  him  is  whether  the 
Free  States,  having  taken  a  stand  for  freedom, 
will  maintain  their  self-possession  and  spirit.  He 
groans  over  the  miserable  straits  to  which  the  na 
tion  is  reduced  by  having  at  its  head  in  this  critical 
hour  a  man  of  such  mediocrity  as  Mr.  Buchanan. 
Again  he  makes  his  familiar  point  that  the  political 
training  of  the  party  in  power  has  caused  a  dis 
tinct  degeneration  in  politics,  and  thus  has  brought 
about  a  state  of  things  which  renders  resistance  to 
the  treasonable  conduct  of  the  leaders  of  secession 
weak  and  ineffective ;  and  he  points  out  with  saga 
city  a  source  of  weakness,  which  nearly  a  genera 
tion  later  was  to  draw  from  him  a  new  political 
moral. 

"  It  has  been  the  misfortune  of  the  United  States 
that  the  conduct  of  their  public  affairs  has  passed 
more  and  more  exclusively  into  the  hands  of  men 
who  have  looked  on  politics  as  a  game  to  be  played 
rather  than  as  a  trust  to  be  administered,  and 
whose  capital,  whether  of  personal  consideration 
or  of  livelihood,  has  been  staked  on  a  turn  of  the 
cards.  A  general  skepticism  has  been  induced, 
exceedingly  dangerous  in  times  like  these.  The 
fatal  doctrine  of  rotation  in  office  has  transferred 
the  loyalty  of  the  numberless  servants  of  the  Gov 
ernment,  and  of  those  dependent  on  or  influenced 
by  them,  from  the  nation  to  a  party.  For  thousands 


22  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

of  families,  every  change  in  the  National  Adminis 
tration  is  as  disastrous  as  revolution,  and  the  Gov 
ernment  has  thus  lost  that  influence  which  the  idea 
of  permanence  and  stability  would  exercise  in  a 
crisis  like  the  present.  At  the  present  moment, 
the  whole  body  of  office-holders  at  the  South  is 
changed  from  a  conservative  to  a  disturbing  ele 
ment  by  a  sense  of  the  insecurity  of  their  tenure. 
Their  allegiance  having  always  been  to  the  party 
in  power  at  Washington,  and  not  to  the  Govern 
ment  of  the  Nation,  they  find  it  easy  to  transfer  it 
to  the  dominant  faction  at  home." 

Even  granting  that  the  secessionists  carry  out 
their  schemes,  the  losers,  he  points  out,  would  not 
be  the  Free  States.  "  The  laws  of  trade  cannot 
be  changed,  and  the  same  causes  which  have  built 
up  their  agriculture,  commerce,  and  manufactures 
will  not  cease  to  be  operative.  The  real  wealth 
and  strength  of  states,  other  things  being  equal, 
depends  upon  homogeneousness  of  population  and 
variety  of  occupation,  with  a  common  interest  and 
common  habits  of  thought.  The  cotton-growing 
States,  with  their  single  staple,  are  at  the  mercy 
of  chance.  India,  Australia,  nay  Africa  herself, 
may  cut  the  thread  of  their  prosperity.  Their 
population  consists  of  two  hostile  races,  and  their 
bone  and  muscle,  instead  of  being  the  partners,  are 
the  unwilling  tools  of  their  capital  and  intellect. 
The  logical  consequence  of  this  political  theory  is 
despotism,  which  the  necessity  of  coercing  the  sub 
ject  race  will  make  a  military  one." 

A  month   later  the  situation  had  become  still 


LOWELL  AND   THE  WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    23 

more  serious,  and  in  his  article  "  E  Pluribus 
Unum,"  which  is  reprinted  in  "  Political  Essays," 
Lowell  writes  with  an  earnestness  which  appears 
even  in  the  wit  and  humor  that  play  over  the  sur 
face.  After  discussing  with  an  impatient  scorn 
the  sophisms  of  secession,  he  inquires  if  any  new 
facts  have  come  to  light  since  the  election  which 
would  lead  the  people  to  reconsider  the  resolution 
then  made.  "  Since  the  election  of  Mr.  Lincoln, 
not  one  of  the  arguments  has  lost  its  force,  not  a 
cipher  of  the  statistics  has  been  proved  mistaken, 
on  which  the  judgment  of  the  people  was  made 
up."  And  then,  after  reaffirming  the  limitations 
of  the  power  to  be  assumed  by  the  Republican 
party,  he  bursts  forth  :  — 

"  But  the  present  question  is  one  altogether 
transcending  all  limits  of  party  and  all  theories  of 
party  policy.  It  is  a  question  of  national  exist 
ence  ;  it  is  a  question  whether  Americans  shall 
govern  America,  or  whether  a  disappointed  clique 
shall  nullify  all  government  now,  and  render  a 
stable  government  difficult  hereafter  ;  it  is  a  ques 
tion,  not  whether  we  shall  have  civil  war  under 
certain  contingencies,  but  whether  we  shall  prevent 
it  under  any.  It  is  idle,  and  worse  than  idle,  to 
talk  about  Central  Republics  that  can  never  be 
formed.  We  want  neither  Central  Republics  nor 
Northern  Republics,  but  our  own  Republic  and 
that  of  our  fathers,  destined  one  day  to  gather  the 
whole  continent  under  a  flag  that  shall  be  the  most 
august  in  the  world.  Having  once  known  what  it 
was  to  be  members  of  a  grand  and  peaceful  con- 


24  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

stellation,  we  shall  not  believe,  without  further 
proof,  that  the  laws  of  our  gravitation  are  to  be 
abolished,  and  we  flung  forth  into  chaos,  a  hurly- 
burly  of  jostling  and  splintering  stars,  whenever 
Robert  Toombs  or  Robert  Rhett,  or  any  other  Bob 
of  the  secession  kite,  may  give  a  flirt  of  self-im 
portance.  The  first  and  greatest  benefit  of  govern 
ment  is  that  it  keeps  the  peace,  that  it  insures 
every  man  his  right,  and  not  only  that  but  the 
permanence  of  it.  In  order  to  do  this,  its  first 
requisite  is  stability  ;  and  this  once  firmly  settled, 
the  greater  the  extent  of  conterminous  territory 
that  can  be  subjected  to  one  system  and  one  lan 
guage  and  inspired  by  one  patriotism,  the  better. 
.  .  .  Slavery  is  110  longer  the  matter  in  debate,  and 
we  must  beware  of  being  led  off  upon  that  side- 
issue.  The  matter  now  in  hand  is  the  reestablish- 
ment  of  order,  the  reaffirmation  of  national  unity, 
and  the  settling  once  for  all  whether  there  can  be 
such  a  thing  as  a  government  without  the  right  to 
use  its  power  in  self-defence."  And  he  closes  with 
the  solemn  words :  "  Peace  is  the  greatest  of  bless 
ings,  when  it  is  won  and  kept  by  manhood  and 
wisdom ;  but  it  is  a  blessing  that  will  not  long  be 
the  housemate  of  cowardice.  It  is  God  alone  who 
is  powerful  enough  to  let  His  authority  slumber  ; 
it  is  only  His  laws  that  are  strong  enough  to  pro 
tect  and  avenge  themselves.  Every  human  gov 
ernment  is  bound  to  make  its  laws  so  far  resemble 
His  that  they  shall  be  uniform,  certain,  and  un 
questionable  in  their  operations  ;  and  this  it  can  do 
only  by  a  timely  show  of  power,  and  by  an  appeal 


LOWELL  AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    25 

to  that  authority  which  is  of  divine  right,  inasmuch 
as  its  office  is  to  maintain  that  order  which  is  the 
single  attribute  of  that  Infinite  Reason  which  we 
can  clearly  apprehend  and  of  which  we  have  hourly 
example." 

The  article  headed  "  The  Pickens-and-Stealins' 
Rebellion,"  which  appeared  in  the  Atlantic  for 
June,  1861,  was  the  latest  of  the  political  articles 
contributed  by  Lowell  to  the  magazine  while  he 
was  editor,  and  appeared  just  as  he  surrendered 
his  charge  to  Mr.  Fields.  It  was  written  immedi 
ately  after  the  attack  on  Fort  Sumter  and  in  the 
glow  of  that  popular  rising  which  swept  away  all 
the  flimsy  structure  of  the  politicians  and  showed 
the  might  of  that  conviction  which  Lowell  never 
doubted  to  lie  in  the  minds  of  the  American  peo 
ple.  He  longed  then  for  a  great  leader.  *  Major 
Anderson  served  for  a  brief  hour  to  typify  the 
spirit  of  uncompromising  fidelity  to  duty,  but  Low 
ell  was  disappointed  in  Lincoln's  public  utterances. 
He  was  impatient  at  the  President's  caution,  and 
especially  at  the  temporizing  policy  which  he  pur 
sued  toward  the  Border  States,  and  he  traced  the 
course  of  events  before  the  first  gun  was  fired  on 
Sumter  with  the  evident  conviction  that  a  firmer 
policy  would  have  been  surer  to  defeat  the  plans  of 
the  Confederacy ;  but  the  splendid  assertion  of  the 
Union  spirit  fills  him  with  an  almost  awed  sense  of 
joy.  "  We  have  no  doubt  of  the  issue,"  he  writes. 
"  We  believe  that  the  strongest  battalions  are  al 
ways  on  the  side  of  God.  The  Southern  army  will 
be  fighting  for  Jefferson  Davis,  or  at  most  for  the 


26  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

liberty  of  self-misgovernraent,  while  we  go  forth 
for  the  defence  of  principles  which  alone  make  gov 
ernment  august  and  civil  society  possible.  It  is 
the  very  life  of  the  nation  that  is  at  stake.  There 
is  no  question  here  of  dynasties,  races,  religions, 
but  simply  whether  we  will  consent  to  include  in 
our  Bill  of  Rights  —  not  merely  as  of  equal  valid 
ity  with  all  other  rights,  whether  natural  or  ac 
quired,  but  by  its  very  nature  transcending  and 
abrogating  them  all  —  the  Right  of  Anarchy.  We 
must  convince  men  that  treason  against  the  ballot- 
box  is  as  dangerous  as  treason  against  a  throne, 
and  that,  if  they  play  so  desperate  a  game,  they 
must  stake  their  lives  on  the  hazard.  ...  A  ten 
years'  war  would  be  cheap  that  gave  us  a  country 
to  be  proud  of,  and  a  flag  that  should  command 
the  respect  of  the  world  because  it  was  the  symbol 
of  the  enthusiastic  unity  of  a  great  nation.  .  .  . 
We  cannot  think  that  the  war  we  are  entering  on 
can  end  without  some  radical  change  in  the  system 
of  African  slavery.  Whether  it  be  doomed  to  a 
sudden  extinction,  or  to  a  gradual  abolition  through 
economical  causes,  this  war  will  not  leave  it  where 
it  was  before.  As  a  power  in  the  state  its  reign  is 
already  over.  The  fiery  tongue  of  the  batteries  in 
Charleston  harbor  accomplished  in  one  day  a  con 
version  which  the  constancy  of  Garrison  and  the 
eloquence  of  Phillips  had  failed  to  bring  about  in 
thirty  years.  And  whatever  other  result  this  war 
is  destined  to  produce,  it  has  already  won  for  us 
a  blessing  worth  everything  to  us  as  a  nation  in 
emancipating  the  public  opinion  of  the  North." 


LOWELL  AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    27 

Thus  in  his  last  sentence  he  reiterates  the  judg 
ment  which  he  had  over  and  over  again  pronounced 
in  the  whole  series  of  these  political  papers,  for 
he  never  lost  sight  of  the  fundamental  fact  that 
freedom  resides  in  the  spirit  of  man  and  is  but 
recorded  in  his  institutions. 

Once  more  he  wrote  a  prose  paper  for  the  At 
lantic,  moved  by  the  attitude  in  England,  for  with 
others  of  his  kind  Lowell  took  grievously  to  heart 
the  comments  of  the  English  press  and  the  actions 
of  the  British  government.  In  this  paper,  pub 
lished  December,  1861,  entitled  "  Self-Possession 
vs.  Prepossession,"  he  finds  unmistakable  symp 
toms  of  reaction  in  England,  since  1848,  against 
liberalism  in  politics,  and  tries  the  criticism  of  the 
United  States  government  in  which  the  press  in 
dulged  by  the  action  of  England  toward  Ireland 
and  India  ;  and  finally  he  points  out  the  restric 
tions  imposed  on  any  constitutional  government  by 
the  very  conditions  of  its  existence,  forbidding  it 
to  act  in  advance  of  the  convictions  of  its  people. 
This  he  does  to  defend  the  administration  against 
the  charge  that  it  is  indifferent  to  the  question  of 
emancipation.  He  is  impatient  indeed  of  the  ex 
treme  caution  of  Mr.  Lincoln  and  his  associates, 
but  he  is  nevertheless  of  the  opinion  that  the  time 
has  not  yet  come  for  turning  the  war  into  a  cru 
sade.  •  It  is  interesting  to  mark  how  uppermost  in 
Lowell's  mind  is  the  cause  of  national  unity.*  Time 
was  when  he  drew  near  to  the  position  taken  by 
some  of  his  anti-slavery  associates  that  disunion 
was  preferable  to  complicity  with  slavery  ;  but  as 


28  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  conflict  between  the  two  opposing  forces  deep 
ened,  he  took  more  and  more  steadily  the  larger 
view,  and  his  democratic  principles  became  bound 
up  with  the  unity  of  the  nation,  and  at  last  with 
the  supremacy  of  law  as  represented  by  the  na 
tional  cause.  1 

"  Is  this  then,"  he  breaks  out  fervently  at  the 
close  of  his  paper,  "  to  be  a  commonplace  war,  a 
prosaic  and  peddling  quarrel  about  cotton  ?  Shall 
there  be  nothing  to  enlist  enthusiasm  or  kindle 
fanaticism  ?  Are  we  to  have  no  cause  like  that  for 
which  our  English  republican  ancestors  died  so 
gladly  on  the  field,  with  such  dignity  on  the  scaf 
fold? —  no  cause  that  shall  give  us  a  hero,  who 
knows  but  a  Cromwell?  To  our  minds,  though  it 
may  be  obscure  to  Englishmen,  who  look  on  Lan 
cashire  as  the  centre  of  the  universe,  no  army  was 
ever  enlisted  for  a  nobler  service  than  ours.  Not 
only  is  it  national  life  and  a  foremost  place  among 
nations  that  is  at  stake,  but  the  vital  principle  of 
Law  itself,  the  august  foundation  on  which  the 
very  possibility  of  government,  above  all  of  self- 
government,  rests  as  in  the  hollow  of  God's  own 
hand.  If  democracy  shall  prove  itself  capable  of 
having  raised  twenty  millions  of  people  to  a  level 
of  thought  where  they  can  appreciate  this  cardinal 
truth,  and  can  believe  no  sacrifice  too  great  for  its 
defence  and  establishment,  then  democracy  will 
have  vindicated  itself  beyond  all  chance  of  future 
cavil.  Here,  we  think,  is  a  Cause  the  experience 
of  whose  vicissitudes  and  the  grandeur  of  whose 
triumph  will  be  able  to  give  us  heroes  and  states- 


LOWELL  AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    29 

men.  1  The  Slave-Power  must  be  humbled,  must  be 
punished,  —  so  humbled  and  so  punished  as  to  be 
a  warning  forever;  but  slavery  is  an  evil  transient 
in  its  cause  and  its  consequence,  compared  with 
those  which  would  result  from  unsettling  the  faith 
of  a  nation  in  its  own  manhood,  and  setting  a 
whole  generation  of  men  hopelessly  adrift  in  the 
formless  void  of  anarchy." 

The  reserve  with  which  he  speaks  of  the  Presi 
dent's  policy  is  the  wise  tone  to  be  adopted  in  a 
printed  article.  In  his  private  letters,  where  such 
caution  is  not  needed,  he  gives  expression  openly 
to  his  impatience.  In  a  letter  written  at  the  same 
time  as  this  article,  he  says :  "  I  confess  that  my 
opinion  of  the  Government  does  not  rise,  to  say 
the  least.  If  we  are  saved  it  will  be  God's  doing, 
not  man's,  and  will  He  save  those  who  are  not 
worth  saving?  Lincoln  may  be  right,  for  aught  I 
know,  —  prudence  is  certainly  a  good  drag  upon 
virtue,  —  but  I  guess  an  ounce  of  Fremont  is  worth 
a  pound  of  long  Abraham.  Mr.  L.  seems  to  have 
a  theory  of  carrying  on  war  without  hurting  the 
enemy.  He  is  incapable,  apparently,  of  under 
standing  that  they  ought  to  be  hurt.  The  doing 
good  to  those  that  despitefully  entreat  us  was  not 
meant  for  enemies  of  the  commonwealth.  The 
devil's  angels  are  those  that  do  his  work,  and  for 
such  there  is  a  lake  of  fire  and  brimstone  prepared. 
We  have  been  undertaking  to  frighten  the  Devil 
with  cold  pitch. 

"  At  the  same  time  it  looks  as  if  the  rebels  must 
be  losing  more  than  we.  They  must  be  poorly  off 


30  JAMES  RUSSELL   LOWELL 

for  most  things  that  go  to  make  up  the  efficiency 
of  an  army,  and  if  they  can't  attack  us  what  can 
they  do  ?  I  am  in  a  constant  state  of  w/ipleasur- 
able  excitement.  Jemmy l  and  Willy  2  are  at  Lees- 
burg,  in  full  sight  of  the  enemy's  pickets,  and  I 
can't  bear  to  think  of  either  of  them  being  hurt. 
Mary  was  here  last  night,  and  though  she  puts  a 
good  face  on  it,  there  was  something  very  painful 
to  me  in  the  hoarse  hollowness  of  her  voice.  If 
they  should  die  in  battle  well  on  into  the  enemy's 
lines,  it  would  be  all  that  one  could  ask,  but  it 
would  be  dreadful  to  have  them  picked  off  by 
those  murdering  cowards.  Let 's  think  of  some 
thing  else." 

A  month  later,  and  the  boys  he  spoke  of  so 
affectionately  and  tremulously  had  fallen.  In  that 
most  affecting  of  the  second  series  of  the  "  Biglow 
Papers,"  "  Mr.  Hosea  Biglow  to  the  Editor  of 
the  Atlantic  Monthly"  printed  at  the  close  of  the 
war,  he  could  refer  to  them  in  verse  which  holds 
all  the  passion  of  tears.  Now,  he  can  only  send 
tidings  to  his  most  intimate  friend  in  a  few  re 
strained  words  :  "  We  have  the  worst  news.  Dear 
Willie  is  killed,  and  James  badly  wounded.  They 
must  have  behaved  like  men.  Think  of  poor  Mary, 
whose  husband  is  so  ill  that  he  cannot  be  told  of  it. 
She  does  not  know  it  yet,  though  she  is  prepared. 
But  he  will  be  brought  home  this  afternoon.  He 
was  truly  a  noble  young  fellow.  Simple,  brave, 
and  pure  I  knew  him  to  be  in  a  very  rare  measure. 

1  James  Jackson  Lowell. 

2  William  Lowell  Putnam. 


LOWELL   AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    31 

We  have  the  pride  of  knowing  that  our  men  must 
have  done  well.  Of  the  officers  of  the  20th,  two 
were  drowned,  and  all  the  rest  (except  Col.  Lee) 
wounded.  Willie  was  the  only  one  killed.  Wen 
dell  Holmes  wounded.  Last  despatch  says,  '  Low 
ell  and  Holmes  doing  well  this  morning,'  —  that  's 
to-day.  Thank  God  for  that,  and  that  they  all  did 
their  duty."  Two  days  later  he  added :  "  He  came 
home  yesterday  afternoon,  his  face  little  changed, 
they  tell  me,  and  with  a  smile  on  it.  He  got  his 
wound  as  we  could  wish.  The  adjutant  of  the 
regiment  was  hit,  Willie  sprang  forward  to  help 
him,  and  was  shot  instantly.  Jamie  sprang  to 
help  him,  and  was  hit,  but  will  be  about  again  in 
ten  days  or  so.  ...  It  is  some  consolation  to  think 
that  he  was  struck  in  so  graceful  an  action,  and  his 
wound  is  in  front,  as  I  knew  it  would  be." 

The  depth  of  feeling  which  appears  in  his  prose 
at  this  time,  as  he  tries  to  set  forth  the  essential 
character  of  the  great  conflict,  could  scarcely  fail 
to  find  manifestation  in  poetry,  since  that  was  his 
native  speech.  Yet  it  required  genuine  possession 
of  mind.  In  the  years  just  preceding  the  actual 
breaking  out  of  war  Lowell  could,  as  we  have 
seen,  treat  with  badinage  such  manifestations  as 
the  American  Tract  Society,  and  the  speech-mak 
ing  of  Choate  and  Gushing ;  he  could,  indeed,  pass 
in  these  papers  from  satire  to  earnest  examination 
of  fundamentals ;  but  somehow  he  could  not  bring 
himself  to  use  the  keener  weapon  which  he  had 
handled  so  skilfully  in  the  discussion  over  Texas 
and  the  Mexican  War.  "  Friendly  people  say  to 


32  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

me  sometimes,"  he  writes  to  Thomas  Hughes,  13 
September,  1859,  " 4  write  us  more  "  Biglow  Pa 
pers,"  '  and  I  have  even  been  simple  enough  to  try, 
only  to  find  that  I  could  not."  And. a  couple  of 
months  later  R.  G.  White  writes  :  "  The  Atlantic 
has  just  come  in,  and  I  miss  what  you  led  me  to 
expect  from  your  friend  B.  O.  F.  Sawin."  He 
had  plainly  made  a  deliberate  attempt,  for  in  July 
of  this  year  he  was  writing  to  Mr.  Norton  :  "  I 
have  a  new  '  Biglow  '  running  in  my  head,  and  I 
shall  write  it  as  soon  as  my  brain  clears  off.  At 
present  I  feel  all  the  time  like  the  next  morning 
without  having  had  the  day  before,  which  is  too 
bad.  I  think  my  new  '  Biglow  '  will  be  funny.  If 
not  you  will  never  see  it.  It  will  be  on  the  reopen 
ing  of  the  slave  trade,  and  some  rather  humorous 
combinations  have  come  into  my  mind.  We  shall 
see." 

It  is  not  improbable  that  the  impetus  to  verse 
came  from  the  stirring  of  his  personal  emotions 
in  the  autumn  of  1861,  when  he  was  following 
with  anxious  yet  proud  emotions  the  career  of  the 
two  nephews  whom  he  loved  with  that  freedom 
which  an  uncle  bestows  on  those  who,  not  his  own 
children,  are  yet  his  children's  nearest  kin.  It 
was  on  21)  September  that  he  wrote  of  the  "  con 
stant  state  of  rmpleasurable  excitement "  under 
which  he  labored.  On  8  October  he  writes  to  Mr. 
Fields,  who  had  been  urging  him  to  send  a  contri 
bution  to  the  Atlantic :  "  I  set  about  a  poem  last 
night,  —  apropos  of  the  times,  —  and  hope  to  finish 
it  to-morrow,  and  if  it  turn  out  to  be  good  for 


LOWELL   AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    33 

anything,  I  will  send  it  at  once,  and  you  can  print 
it  or  no  as  you  like." 

This  poem  was  "  The  Washers  of  the  Shroud," 
which  appeared  in  the  November  Atlantic.  The 
same  thought  prevails  in  this  poem  which  found 
ampler  expression  in  his  prose,  as  we  have  seen,  a 
conviction  that  his  country  was  not  to  '*  join  the 
waiting  ghosts  of  names,"  but  was  to  have  the 

"  larger  manhood,  saved  for  those 
That  walk  unblenching  through  the  trial-fires."  1 

How  deeply  he  felt  the  poem  may  be  seen  not  only 
in  the  solemn  measure  of  the  verse  itself,  but  in 
the  confession  of  physical  exhaustion  in  which  the 
writing  of  it  left  him.2  Most  impressive  was  the 
coincidence  of  the  final  stanza  with  the  news  which 
reached  Elm  wood  just  as  the  poem  itself  fell  under 
the  eye  of  the  great  public.  "  God,  give  us  peace  !  " 
he  had  said  in  the  penultimate  stanza,  — 

"  God,  give  us  peace  !  —  not  such  as  lulls  to  sleep, 
But  sword  on  thigh,  and  brow  with  purpose  knit ! 
And  let  our  Ship  of  State  to  harbor  sweep, 
Her  ports  all  up,  her  battle-lanterns  lit, 
And  her  leashed  thunders  gathering  for  their  leap  !  " 

And  then, 

"  So  cried  I,  with  clenched  hands  and  passionate  pain, 
Thinking  of  dear  ones  by  Potomac's  side  : 

1  It  was  very  likely  after  reading  this  poem  that  Emerson  wrote 
in  his  diary,  17  January,   1862  :   "  We  will  not  again  disparage 
America  now  that  we  have  seen  what  men  it  will  bear.     What  a 
certificate  of  good  elements  in  the  soil,  climate,  and  institutions 
is  Lowell,  whose  admirable  verses  I  have  just  read !    Such  a  crea 
ture  more  accredits  the  land  than  all  the  fops  of  Carolina  dis 
credit  it." 

2  See  Letters,  i.  318. 


34  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Again  the  loon  laughed  mocking,  and  again 
The  echoes  bayed  far  down  the  night  and  died, 
While  waking  I  recalled  my  wandering  brain."  * 

There  is  a  single  sentence  in  a  letter  written 
four  days  before  the  fatal  news  came  which  helps 
to  show  that  side  of  Lowell's  nature  out  of  which 
his  best  work  sprang,  the  attitude  of  receptivity  to 
the  large  elemental  life.  Taken  in  connection  with 
the  sudden  blow  so  soon  to  fall,  it  enables  one  to 
understand  better  the  power  by  which  Lowell  was 
aroused  to  action  :  "  These  last  rains  have  been 
lifting  the  leaves  (si  levan  le  foglie)  with  a  ven 
geance,  making  as  clean  work  as  ever  Highland 
Cateran  with  cattle.  I  can't  understand  people 
who  call  autumn  a  melancholy  season  unless  they 
are  cockneys  indeed.  To  a  country-bred  fellow 
like  me,  the  exquisite  atmosphere  and  the  dear  as 
sociations  with  nutting  and  fishing  and  trying  to 
shoot  ducks,  and  lying  under  warm  hillsides,  make 
it  anything  but  sad.  Even  to  see  the  leaves  fall 
is  a  pleasure  to  me  which  few  others  match." 

Certain  it  is  that  from  this  time  there  seemed  to 
be  a  new  and,  I  think,  loftier  and  more  sustained 
spirit  in  his  writing  upon  the  great  issues  of  the 
day.  For  one  thing,  he  found  vent  in  a  rapid  suc 
cession  of  poems  which  form  the  second  series  of 
the  "  Biglow  Papers."  Early  in  December,  1861, 
he  wrote  the  first,  apparently  under  pressure  to 
return  to  this  form.  "  It  was  clean  against  my 

1  Eight  years  later,  when  writing  in  his  happiest  mood  the 
paper  "  A  Good  Word  for  Winter,"  the  memory  of  these  boys 
came  back  with  the  suggestion  of  snow-forts,  and  tears  trembled 
in  the  passage  which  slipped  from  his  pen. 


LOWELL   AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    35 

critical  judgment,"  he  writes,  "  for  I  don't  believe 
in  resuscitations  —  we  hear  no  good  of  the  post 
humous  Lazarus  —  but  I  may  get  into  the  vein 
and  do  some  good  ; "  and  it  is  clear  that  the  effort 
did  seat  him  again  in  the  saddle,  for  he  followed 
his  first  paper,  which  appeared  in  January,  1862, 
with  five  more  in  successive  months,  which  were  in 
effect  pungent  comments  on  the  course  of  events 
in  that  dark  period.  He  had  apparently  the  stimu 
lus  of  an  engagement  with  Mr.  Fields,  the  editor 
of  the  Atlantic,  for  we  find  him  in  August  confess 
ing  his  inability  to  bring  to  light  another  paper 
which  was  confined  somewhere  in  his  perplexed 
brain. 

Lowell  could  not  of  course  escape  his  own 
shadow  cast  by  the  brilliant  success  of  the  first 
series,  although  fourteen  years  in  a  man's  memory 
does  not  raise  such  an  accumulation  of  fame  as  it 
does  in  the  memory  of  spectators.  He  was  doubt 
less  a  bit  nervous  as  he  essayed  to  repeat  an  earlier 
impromptu,  for  such  the  first  series  may  fairly  be 
called,  but  the  nervousness  really  attacked  only  the 
beginning  of  his  effort ;  once  he  was  fairly  under 
way,  the  old  assurance  all  came  back,  and  it  was 
easy  enough  to  indulge  in  that  vernacular  which 
was  so  imbedded  in  his  early  consciousness  as  to 
be  not  an  acquisition  but  an  inheritance.  The 
Yankee  dialect  and  macaronics,  both  of  which  were 
the  lingo  of  his  boyhood,  were  so  native  to  his  wit 
that  he  handled  them  in  maturity  as  freely  as  one's 
hand  grasps  in  a  return  to  the  country  the  scythe 
which  has  been  swung  in  boyhood. 


36  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

It  is  perhaps  more  to  the  point  to  observe  that, 
as  in  the  earlier  series,  the  figures  of  this  pasto 
ral  had  been  developed  from  suddenly  designed 
sketches  until  they  stood  full  formed  to  the  reader 
in  the  resultant  book,  now,  upon  the  resumption 
of  the  art,  they  became  simply  accepted  types  to 
be  illustrated  rather  than  developed  ;  and  there  is 
therefore  from  the  start  a  firmness  of  touch  and  a 
solidity  of  modelling  which  give  to  the  entire  series 
an  air  of  certainty  and  ease,  as  if  the  author  had 
no  need  to  add  or  rub  out.  There  is  possibly  a 
little  loss  of  buoyancy  and  spontaneity,  but  if  so 
there  is  compensation  in  the  touch  of  wisdom  and 
especially  of  deep  feeling  characteristic  of  the 
series  as  a  whole.  Lowell  is  so  sure  of  the  rustic 
form  he  is  using,  and  of  the  old-fashioned  pedantry 
of  Mr.  Wilbur,  that  he  can  draw  more  confidently 
from  deeper  soundings,  as  indeed  the  very  growth 
of  his  own  nature  compels  him  to  do.  Thus,  while 
the  satire  of  the  earlier  series  is  more  amusing,  that 
of  the  second  is  more  biting.  For  when  he  was 
dealing  with  the  iniquities  of  the  Mexican  war,  he 
was  after  all  contemplating  what  might  be  deemed 
a  cutaneous  disease  as  compared  with  the  deadly 
virus  now  attacking  the  most  vital  part  of  the 
national  body,  and,  moreover,  fourteen  years  of 
personal  experience  such  as  he  had  known  could 
scarcely  fail  to  give  him  more  penetration. 

There  are  one  or  two  surface  indications  of  all 
this  which  may  be  noticed.  Thus,  though  the 
Reverend  Homer  Wilbur  of  the  second  series  is 
the  same  serene,  absconding  sort  of  parson  as  in 


LOWELL  AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    37 

the  first,  now  and  then  Lowell  forgets  the  imper 
sonation  and  speaks  in  his  own  voice.  This  is 
especially  observable  in  the  second  of  the  papers. 
What  Mr.  Wilbur  says  there  respecting  the  Eng 
lish  and  their  criticism  of  America  can  scarcely  be 
distinguished  in  manner  from  Lowell's  own  utter 
ances  in  prose  papers  already  referred  to.  And 
again,  in  the  first  number,  written  when  Lowell 
was  freshly  grieving  over  the  loss  of  his  nephews, 
there  is  a  trumpet  note  in  the  voice  of  Mr.  Wilbur 
which  is  both  the  perfection  of  art  and  the  sin 
cerity  of  feeling.  The  parson  is  defending  himself 
against  the  charge  of  inconsistency  in  allowing  his 
youngest  son  to  raise  a  company  for  the  war.  He 
refers  with  characteristic  complacency  to  the  ex 
ample  he  himself  had  set  by  serving  as  a  chaplain 
in  the  war  of  1812,  and  adds  :  "  It  was,  indeed, 
grievous  to  send  my  Benjamin,  the  child  of  my  old 
age ;  but  after  the  discomfiture  of  Manassas,  I 
with  my  own  hands  did  buckle  on  his  armor,  trust 
ing  in  the  great  Comforter  and  Commander  for 
strength  according  to  my  need.  For  truly  the 
memory  of  a  brave  son  dead  in  his  shroud  were 
a  greater  staff  of  my  declining  years  than  a  living 
coward  (if  those  may  be  said  to  have  lived  who 
carry  all  of  themselves  into  the  grave  with  them), 
though  his  days  might  be  long  in  the  land,  and  he 
should  get  much  goods.  It  is  not  till  our  earthen 
vessels  are  broken  that  we  find  and  truly  possess 
the  treasure  that  was  laid  up  in  them." 

It  is  possible   that   Lowell   took  a  little  alarm 
when  he  read  over  the  prose  introduction  to  his 


38  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

second  paper,  for  thereafter  there  is  a  studied  care 
to  make  Mr.  Wilbur  speak  in  his  own  measured 
tones,  even  to  an  indulgence  in  the  introduction  to 
the  fifth  paper  in  a  piece  of  most  elaborate  non 
sense  mocking  the  antiquary's  enthusiasm.  The 
manner,  at  last,  in  which  Mr.  Wilbur's  death  is 
announced,  the  bringing  upon  the  scenes  for  obitu 
ary  purposes  of  his  colleague  the  Reverend  Jedu- 
thun  Hitchcock,  who  is  deliciously  discriminated 
from  his  senior  yet  shown  to  have  been  formed  out 
of  the  same  clay,  the  posthumous  sayings  from  Mr. 
Wilbur's  Table  Talk,  —  all  this  is  conceived  in  a 
most  sympathetic  and  genuine  spirit  of  art.  The 
delineation  of  old  age,  indeed,  in  this  character 
was,  one  may  guess,  something  more  than  artistic 
imagining.  There  is  a  bit  of  nonsense  which  Lowell 
wrote  to  Miss  Norton  in  1864,  which  for  its  full 
effect  ought  to  be  reproduced  in  facsimile,  for  he 
took  the  most  elaborate  pains  to  transform  his 
hand  into  that  of  a  poor  trembling  old  nonagena 
rian  :  "  Since  I  lost  my  last  tooth,  I  am  a  great 
deal  more  comfortable,  I  thank  you.  The  new 
sett  maide  for  me  Doctor  Tucker's  great  gran  son 
works  well  and  I  eat  comfortable.  Let  me  recom 
mend  Tinto's  hair  dyes.  It  makes  all  black  to  be 
sure,  and  you  look  like  your  fotograms.  My  palsy 
hardly  troubles  me  at  all  now.  My  memory  is  as 
good  as  it  ever  was,  and  my  hand-writing  as  good 
as  in  my  earliest  years.  I  wrote  a  little  poem  last 
week  which  Fanny  thinks  as  good  as  anything  I 
ever  did.  It  begins 

Let  dogs  delight  to  bark  and  bite 
For  't  is  their  nature,  too. 


LOWELL  AND  THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    39 

But  I  don't  think  she  hears  very  well  with  her  new 
trumpet. 

"  Certainly  I  will  dine  with  you  on  Sunday  and 
shall  expect  you  on  Thursday  if  Tuesday  should 
be  a  fair  day.  The  death  of  Holmes  is  an  awful 
warning,  but  one  can't  expect  to  be  very  strong  at 
ninety  nine.  I  remember  his  mother  who  died 
near  fifty  years  ago." 

The  fun  we  make  often  discloses  the  gravity 
that  lies  behind,  as  if  we  could  exorcise  a  spirit  by 
jesting  at  it,  and  Lowell  was  tormented,  strange  to 
say,  by  the  apprehension  of  old  age  long  before 
he  approached  it.  There  is,  therefore,  something 
pathetic  as  well  as  humorous  in  the  fragment  of 
Mr.  Wilbur's  letter  which  introduces  the  "  Latest 
Views  of  Mr.  Biglow."  It  is  the  imitation  palsy 
again,  and  yet  behind  Mr.  Wilbur's  tremulous 
phrases  one  reads  those  strong  convictions  which 
Lowell  held  to  throughout  the  perplexing  days 
before  Gettysburg.  "  Though  I  believe  Slavery," 
Mr.  Wilbur  says,  "  to  have  been  the  cause  of  it 
[the  war]  by  so  thoroughly  demoralizing  North 
ern  politicks  for  its  own  purposes  as  to  give  op 
portunity  and  hope  to  treason,  yet  I  would  not 
have  our  thought  and  purpose  diverted  from  their 
true  object,  —  the  maintenance  of  the  idea  of 
Government.  We  are  not  merely  suppressing  an 
enormous  riot,  but  contending  for  the  possibility 
of  permanent  order  coexisting  with  democratical 
fickleness ;  and  while  I  would  not  superstitiously 
venerate  form  to  the  sacrifice  of  substance,  neither 
would  I  forget  that  an  adherence  to  precedent  and 


40  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

prescription  can  alone  give  that  continuity  and 
coherence  under  a  democratic  constitution  which 
are  inherent  in  the  person  of  a  despotick  monarch 
and  the  selfishness  of  an  aristocratical  class.  Stet 
pro  rations  vohmtas  is  as  dangerous  in  a  majority 
as  in  a  tyrant." 

Distinct  as  are  the  judgments  of  Mr.  Wilbur,  it 
is  after  all  in  the  poems  from  Hosea  Biglow  and 
his  foil  Birdofredom  Sawin  that  we  get  the  freest 
and  most  luminous  expression  of  Lowell's  mind. 
He  began  the  new  series  in  a  low  key  by  recount 
ing  the  experience  of  the  renegade  Yankee  during 
the  years  since  the  Mexican  war,  but  the  affair  of 
the  Trent  happened  immediately  after  he  had  writ 
ten  the  first  paper,  and  before  completing  Birdo- 
fredom's  story  he  dashed  off  that  quaint  fable  of 
the  dialogue  between  the  Bridge  and  the  Monu 
ment,  ending  with  the  verses  "Jonathan  to  John," 
which  was  a  genuine  delivery  of  his  mind.  "If  I 
am  not  mistaken,"  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Fields  on  send 
ing  it,  "  it  will  take.  'T  is  about  Mason  and  Sli- 
dell,  and  I  have  ended  it  with  a  refrain  that  I  hope 
has  a  kind  of  tang  to  it."  The  judgments  which  he 
passed  in  it  were  not  momentary  impulses.  Three 
years  later  he  wrote  a  letter1  which  repeats  in 
prose  much  the  same  sentiments.  It  would  be  diffi 
cult  to  find  a  better  exponent  than  Lowell  of  the 
temper  of  educated  Americans  toward  England,  a 
temper  which  discriminates  sharply  between  the 
England  of  history  and  of  personal  affection  and 
the  England  that  registered  in  the  nineteenth  cen- 

1  Letters,  i.  343. 


N   41; 


LOWELL  AND   THE  WAR  FOR  THE   UNIO 

tury  the  prejudices  of  a  lingering  bureaucratic 
regime. 

In  the  third,  fourth,  and  fifth  papers  Lowell 
used  his  satire  effectively  to  sting  his  countrymen 
into  a  perception  of  the  meaner  side  of  politics,  for 
his  incessant  cry  throughout  his  political  career 
was  for  independence  and  idealism,  and  the  obverse 
was  an  unfailing  denunciation  of  shams  and  cow 
ardly  truckling  to  popular  viewsjX  It  was  when 
he  came  to  the  close  of  the  six  numbers  which  he 
appears  to  have  agreed  to  write  that  he  gave  him 
self  up  to  the  luxury  of  that  bobolink  song  which 
always  swelled  in  his  throat  when  spring  melted 
into  summer.  "  Sunthin'  in  the  Pastoral  Line," 
like  the  opening  notes  of  "  The  Vision  of  Sir  Laun- 
fal,"  like  "Under  the  Willows,"  "  Al  Fresco,"  and 
similar  poems,  is  the  insistent  call  of  Nature  which 
is  perhaps  the  most  unmistakable  witness  in  Low 
ell  of  a  voice  most  his  own  because  least  subject  to 
his  own  volition.  To  be  sure,  Lowell  had  a  truth 
he  wished  to  press,  —  the  need  of  crushing  the  rat 
tlesnake  in  its  head  of  slavery ;  but  he  must  needs 
first  clear  his  throat  by  a  long  sweet  draught  of 
nature,  and  the  mingling  of  pure  delight  in  out 
of  doors  with  the  perplexities  of  the  hour  renders 
this  number  of  the  "  Biglow  Papers  "  one  that  goes 
very  straight  to  the  reader's  heart. 

There  is  no  flagging  in  this  monthly  succession, 
as  one  reads  the  "  Papers  "  now,  but  Lowell  hated 
the  compulsory  business  of  a  poem  a  month,  —  as 
he  says  in  this  latest  number  :  — 


42  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

"  I  thought  ef  this  'ere  milkin'  o'  the  wits 
So  much  a  month,  war  n't  givin'  Natur'  fits,  — 
Ef  folks  war  n't  druv,  findin'  their  own  milk  fail, 
To  work  the  cow  that  hez  an  iron  tail, 
An'  ef  idees  'thout  ripenin'  in  the  pan 
Would  send  up  cream  to  humor  ary  man." 

And  he  wrote  to  Fields,  5  June,  1862  :  "  It 's  no 
use.  I  reverse  the  gospel  difficulty,  and  while  the 
flesh  is  willing  enough,  the  spirit  is  weak.  My 
brain  must  lie  fallow  a  spell,  —  there  is  no  super 
phosphate  for  those  worn-out  fields.  Better  no 
crop  than  small  potatoes.  I  want  to  have  the  pas 
sion  of  the  thing  on  me  again  and  beget  lusty  Big- 
lows.  I  am  all  the  more  dejected  because  you 
have  treated  me  so  well.  But  I  must  rest  awhile. 
My  brain  is  out  of  kilter."  And  again  in  August 
he  wrote  to  the  same  :  "  Give  me  a  victory  and  I 
will  give  you  a  poem  :  but  I  am  now  clear  down  in 
the  bottom  of  the  well,  where  I  see  the  Truth  too 
near  to  make  verses  of." 

So  it  was  six  months  before  he  wrote  again,  this 
time  the  "  Latest  Views  of  Mr.  Biglow."  He  car 
ried  out  his  plan,  after  this  interval,  of  putting  an 
end  to  Mr.  Wilbur.  The  verses  repeat  his  impa 
tience  for  some  action,  some  great  leader,  but  at 
the  close  he  bursts  forth  into  exultation  over  Lin 
coln's  proclamation  of  emancipation.  And  then, 
for  two  years  and  more,  Hosea  keeps  silence. 

Yet  if  victory  did  not  arouse  him,  the  greater 
theme  of  sacrifice  called  out  one  of  his  most  sol 
emn  and  stirring  odes,  that  dedicated  to  the  mem 
ory  of  Robert  Gould  Shaw,  and  entitled  "  Memoria3 
Positum  R.  G.  Shaw."  It  may  well  be  read  in 


LOWELL  AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    43 

connection  with  the  other  poem  suggested  by  the 
events  of  the  war  in  1863,  "  Two  Scenes  from  the 
Life  of  Blondel."  There  is  in  this  parable  a  half 
confession  of  failure,  a  reflection  upon  ideals  once 
held  gallantly  and  then  trailed  in  the  dust  of  dis 
appointment.  He  seems  to  have  written  the  first 
scene,  in  which  Lincoln  is  the  ideal  captain,  with 
out  at  first  designing  the  second,  for  he  writes  to 
Mr.  Fields,  who  already  had  the  first :  "I  have 
written  a  Palinode  to  '  Blondel,'  and  so  made  two 
poems  of  it.  The  latter  half  is  half-humorous  and, 
I  think,  will  help  the  effect.  You  see  how  danger 
ous  it  is  to  pay  a  poet  handsomely  beforehand.  I 
don't  know  where  I  shall  stop.  I  shall  be  sending 
an  epic  presently.  ...  I  should  like  your  notion 
of  the  second  part  of  Blondel,  which  (in  the  first 
relief  of  incubation)  I  am  inclined  to  think  clever. 
But  there  was  nothing  wiser  than  Horace's  ninth 
year  —  only  it  overwhelms  us  like  a  ninth  wave 
(that 's  Wendell's,  tenth  the  Latins  said,  but  I 
wanted  nine),  and  if  we  kept  our  verses  so  long 
we  should  print  none  of  them.  A  strong  argu 
ment  for  monthly  magazines,  you  see."  There  is  so 
little  of  the  essentially  dramatic  about  Lowell's 
poetry  that  it  is  not  unfair  to  hear  his  voice  only 
slightly  changed  in  such  a  poem  as  this.  But  all 
such  speculative  and  half-moody  expressions  gave 
way  before  the  dignity  of  Shaw's  death.  "  I  would 
rather  have  my  name  known  and  blest,  as  his 
will  be,"  Lowell  writes  to  Colonel  Shaw's  mother, 
"  through  all  the  hovels  of  an  outcast  race,  than 
blaring  from  all  the  trumpets  of  repute."  And 


44  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  ultimate  judgment  which  he  held,  despite  the 
confusion  wrought  by  all  the  meaner  passions  of 
the  time  which  vext  his  soul,  rings  out  clearly  in 
the  final  lines :  — 

"  Dear  Land,  -whom  triflers  now  make  bold  to  scorn, 
(Thee !  from  whose  forehead  Earth  awaits  her  morn,) 

How  nobler  shall  the  sun 

Flame  in  thy  sky,  how  braver  breathe  thy  air, 
That  thou  bred'st  children  who  for  thee  couldst  dare 

And  die  as  thine  have  done  !  "  1 

For  the  one  note,  in  the  discord  of  the  war, 
heard  more  and  more  clearly  by  Lowell,  was  that 
of  triumph  for  democracy  as  incarnate  in  his  coun 
try.  No  one  can  read  his  writings  from  this  time 
forward  without  observing  how  deep  a  passion  this 
love  of  his  country  was.  In  earlier  life  he  had 
had  a  passion  for  Freedom,  and  the  Freedom  which 
was  to  him  as  the  Lady  to  her  knight,  was  very 
comprehensive  and  took  many  forms.  Now,  in  his 
maturity,  and  when  he  saw  the  one  great  blot 
fading  from  the  escutcheon,  there  was  a  steady 
concentration  of  passion  upon  that  incorporation 
of  freedom  in  the  fair  land  which  seemed  to  his 
imagination  to  have  gotten  her  soul,  and  no  longer 
Earth's  biggest  country,  but  to  have 

"  risen  up  Earth's  greatest  nation." 

1  In  an  interesting  letter  to  J.  B.  Thayer  (Letters,  ii.  191),  Low 
ell  says,  comparing  his  odes  with  those  of  Gray  and  Coleridge  : 
' '  All  these  were  written  for  the  closet  —  and  mine  for  recitation. 
I  chose  my  measures  with  my  ears  open.  So  I  did  in  writing  the 
poem  on  Rob  Shaw.  That  is  regular  because  meant  only  to  be 
read,  and  because  also  I  thought  it  should  have  in  the  form  of  its 
stanza  something  of  the  formality  of  an  epitaph." 


LOWELL   AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    45 

The  "  Biglow  Papers  "  had  appeared  in  the  At 
lantic.  There  also  had  been  printed  his  "  Blon- 
del  "  and  "  Memorise  Positum  R.  G.  Shaw ;  "  but 
since  the  article  in  December,  1861,  "  Self-Posses 
sion  vs.  Prepossession,"  and  another  in  January, 
1863, 1  he  had  not  made  that  magazine  the  vehicle 
for  prose  articles  on  public  affairs,  as  had  been  his 
practice  during  his  editorship  of  it.  Now,  at  the 
close  of  1863,  he  entered  upon  an  engagement  which 
was  to  give  him  a  new  medium  for  communication, 
and  one  which  he  used  effectively  for  the  next  ten 
years.  The  North  American  Review,  which  had 
been  founded  by  a  number  of  cultivated  gentlemen 
in  Boston  in  1815,  was  modelled  on  the  famous 
quarterlies  of  Great  Britain,  and  had  for  fifty 
years  been  the  leading  representative  in  America 
of  dignified  scholarship  and  literature.  At  times 
it  had  been  spirited  and  aggressive,  but  for  the 
most  part  it  had  stood  rather  for  elegant  leisure 
and  a  somewhat  remote  criticism.  For  the  last 
ten  years  it  had  been  conducted  in  a  temperate  and 
careful  way  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Andrew  P.  Peabody, 
who  held  by  the  old  traditions.  But  its  fortunes 
were  at  a  low  ebb,  it  no  longer  was  a  power,  and 
the  publishers,  hoping  to  reinstate  it  in  authority, 
applied  to  Lowell  to  take  charge  of  it.  He  saw 
the  opportunity  it  would  give  him,  and  he  accepted 
the  offer,  but  only  on  condition  that  Mr.  Norton 
should  be  associated  with  him  as  active  editor. 
The  advertisement  put  forth  by  the  publishers 
was  such  as  to  quiet  the  minds  of  any  who  might 

1  "  In  the  Halfway  House." 


46  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

be  uneasy  over  a  change  of  conduct;  for,  after 
naming  the  new  editors,  it  characterized  them  as 
"gentlemen  who,  for  sound  and  elegant  scholar 
ship,  have  achieved  an  enviable  reputation,  both  in 
this  country  and  in  Europe ;  and  whose  taste,  edu 
cation,  and  experience  eminently  qualify  them  for 
the  position  they  have  assumed.  Of  the  former  it 
may  be  said  that  his  essays  in  the  periodical  which, 
under  his  editorship,  reached  the  summit  of  its  fame, 
surpassed  in  vigor  and  force  those  of  any  contribu 
tor  ;  of  the  latter,  that  he  has  '  added  new  honors 
to  the  name  he  bears  by  the  extent  and  variety  of 
his  knowledge,  and  by  the  force  and  elegance  which 
he  has  exhibited  both  as  a  writer  and  a  speaker.' 
And  of  both,  that  their  thorough  loyalty  to  the  lib 
eral  institutions  of  our  country,  and  their  sympathy 
with  the  progressive  element  of  the  times,  renders 
them  peculiarly  fitted  to  conduct  the  Review,  which 
has  by  competent  authority  been  pronounced  4  the 
leading  literary  organ  of  the  country,'  and  of  which 
it  has  been  said  '  it  has  not  its  equal  in  America, 
nor  its  superior  in  the  world.'  "  The  advertise 
ment  continued  in  measured  phrases  to  announce 
the  policy  of  the  review,  and  it  would  have  been 
difficult  for  its  old  subscribers  to  detect  any  pro 
mise  of  change,  though  as  a  matter  of  fact,  while 
the  term  scholarly  could  equally  well  be  applied  to 
it  in  the  next  ten  years,  the  scholarship  was  more 
exact,  the  scope  of  the  review  was  greatly  widened, 
and  for  pungency  and  thoroughness  of  criticism, 
for  good  English  and  for  breadth  of  view,  it  was 
so  strikingly  marked,  that  it  became  a  signal  ex- 


LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    47 

ample  of  how  a  magazine  may  at  once  be  lifted  to 
a  higher  level  without  being  compelled  to  turn  a 
somersault. 

The  advertisement,  however,  which  Crosby  & 
Nichols  put  forth  no  doubt  with  a  dignified  elation, 
excited  Lowell's  ire,  and  he  gave  vent  to  his  annoy 
ance  in  a  rhymed  letter  to  his  colleague  :  — 

"  DEAR  CHARLES,  — 

I  am  mad  as  a  piper 

And  could  bite  those  old  files  like  a  viper, 
Reading  their  d — d  advertisement 
For  donkeys,  and  not  for  the  wise,  meant, 
(Which  undoubtedly  tickles 
Messrs.  Crosby  and  Nichols 
To  the  innermost  jecur 
Or  brain  —  where  they  're  weaker !) 
I  feel  as  if  the  rogues  meant  to  work  us 
Like  the  clowns  of  a  travelling  circus, 
Blowing  their  trumpets  before  us 
In  a  brazen  and  asinine  chorus, 
Sending  advance  troops  of  blackguards 
To  blear  all  the  fences  with  placards,  — 
'  This  is  the  famous  Dan  Rice,  sirs, 
Whose  jokes  are  beyond  any  price,  sirs, 
And  this  is  that  eminent  man  Joe 
Grimes,  so  sublime  on  the  banjo, 
And  especially  great  in  the  prances 
Of  the  best  Ethiopian  dances  !  ' 
Why,  I  feel  my  shamed  visage  o'erdarkle 
With  my  last  evening's  waterproof  charcoal ! 
Dear  Charles,  all  your  articles  toss  by 
And  see  Messrs.  Nichols  and  Crosby : 
Curl  up  your  moustache  like  a  bandit 
And  tell  'em  we  never  will  stand  it 
To  be  treated  (I  put  here  one  more  curse) 
Like  a  couple  of  literate  porkers 
(Nay,  a  literate  one  would  much  rather 
Be  made  into  pork  like  his  father.) 
I  'd  go,  but  must  hurry  to  college 


48  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

To  help  the  confusion  of  knowledge, 
So  remain 

Your  true  friend,  as  you  know  well, 
! ! ! !  '  The  world  famous  James  Russell  Lowell 
Shuperior  every  way  vastly 
To  the  late  justly-favorite  Astley !!!!"' 

Though  Mr.  Norton  took  the  laboring  oar  in 
editing,  Lowell  put  in  his  stroke  now  and  then,  as 
may  be  seen  in  a  letter  to  Mr.  Motley  asking  for  a 
contribution.1  In  that  he  sets  forth  the  situation 
in  a  few  sentences  :  "  You  have  heard,"  he  says, 
"  that  Norton  and  I  have  undertaken  to  edit  the 
North  American,  —  a  rather  Sisyphian  job,  you 
will  say.  It  wanted  three  chief  elements  to  be 
successful.  It  was  n't  thoroughly,  that  is,  thickly 
and  thinly,  loyal,  it  was  n't  lively,  and  it  had  no 
particular  opinions  on  any  particular  subject.  It 
was  an  eminently  safe  periodical,  and  accordingly 
was  in  great  danger  of  running  aground.  It  was 
an  easy  matter,  of  course,  to  make  it  loyal,  —  even 
to  give  it  opinions  (such  as  they  were),  but  to 
make  it  alive  is  more  difficult.  Perhaps  the  day 
of  the  quarterlies  is  gone  by,  and  those  megatheria 
of  letters  may  be  in  the  mere  course  of  nature 
withdrawing  to  their  last  swamps  to  die  in  peace. 
Anyhow,  here  we  are  with  our  megatherium  on  our 
hands,  and  we  must  strive  to  find  what  will  fill  his 
huge  belly,  and  keep  him  alive  a  little  longer." 

That  this  and  similar  letters  were  not  so  much 
evidence  of  Lowell's  energetic  assumption  of  edi 
torial  tasks  as  special  efforts  coaxed  out  of  him 

1  See  Correspondence  of  J.  L.  Motley,  ii.  167.     Copied  in  Let- 
ters,  i.  334. 


LOWELL  AND   THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    49 

by  his  associate,  may  be  inferred  from  a  letter  to 
Mr.  Norton  written  three  days  later,  in  which  he 
begins :  "  It  is  abominable  that  you  should  have 
been  gone  a  whole  month  without  a  letter  from  me, 
—  and  yet  so  wholly  in  accordance  with  natural 
laws  that  you  must  be  pleased  when  I  explain  the 
reason  of  my  silence.  That  I  have  thought  of  you 
I  need  not  say.  Well,  do  you  understand  the 
nature  of  a  cask,  and  accordingly  the  analogous 
human  nature  of  a  '  vessel  of  wrath  ?  '  A  cask  has 
a  bung  which  is  kept  tight,  and  a  spigot  through 
which  it  delights  to  unbosom  itself  into  the  can  for 
refreshment  or  mirth.  But  this  is  not  all.  It  may 
be  never  so  small,  —  a  needle  might  stop  it,  —  but 
if  stopped,  not  a  drop  shall  you  coax  out  of  the 
faucet  for  love  or  money.  Now  when  I  read  your 
letter,  walking  in  the  hot  sun  along  the  side  of  the 
graveyard,  I  was  full  of  good  liquor  reaming  ripe 
to  flow  for  you.  But  you  bound  me  by  a  vow  to 
write  to  Motley  ere  I  wrote  to  you,  and  in  so  doing 
hermetically  sealed  the  vent,  and  locked  up  all  my 
vintage  in  myself.  I  could  have  written  to  you, 
but  Motley  was  another  thing.  And  first  came 
Commencement,  then  Phi  Beta,  then  the  making 
of  my  salt  hay,  and  at  last  I  got  it  done  and  a 
letter  also  to  Howells." 

But  if  Lowell  shirked  the  drudgery  of  editing 
he  £ave  what  was  much  more  worth  while  to  the 

O 

Review  in  his  frequent  contributions.  During  the 
remainder  of  the  war,  and  during  the  early  stages 
of  the  reconstruction  period,  he  had  in  nearly  every 
number  a  political  article.  The  new  editors  issued 


50  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

their  first  number  in  January,  1864,  and  Lowell 
took  for  his  subject  "  The  President's  Policy." 
The  last  direct  public  expression  he  had  given  of 
his  estimate  of  Mr.  Lincoln  was  in  his  Atlantic 
article  in  December,  1861.  Two  years  had  passed 
since  that  time  and  the  question  was  now  looming 
up  of  the  election  of  Mr.  Lincoln's  successor.  The 
election  was  to  be  held  in  November,  1864,  and 
the  four  articles  which  Lowell  wrote  in  the  quar 
terly  numbers  of  that  year  are  all  practically  argu 
ments  for  the  reelection  of  Mr.  Lincoln.  The 
January  article,  combined  (with  some  confusion 
of  tenses)  with  what  he  wrote  after  the  President's 
death,  now  appears  under  the  title  "  Abraham  Lin 
coln,"  in  "  Political  Essays."  The  estimate  of  the 
President,  made  for  the  most  part  when  Lincoln 
was  under  fire,  not  only  from  his  political  oppo 
nents,  but  from  those  who  might  be  expected  to 
support  him,  is  a  clear  appreciation  of  those  great 
qualities  of  patience  and  balance  of  mind  which 
have  come  to  be  recognized  as  the  source  of  his 
strength.  Lowell,  as  we  have  seen,  had  not  at  the 
outset  refrained  from  a  critical  attitude  toward 
Lincoln.  Now  he  confesses  his  own  blunder  and 
throws  the  confession  into  the  scales  when  weighing 
him.  "  Mr.  Lincoln,  as  it  seems  to  us  in  reviewing 
his  career,  though  we  have  sometimes  in  our  impa 
tience  thought  otherwise,  has  always  waited,  as  a 
wise  man  should,  till  the  right  moment  brought  up 
all  his  reserves  ; "  and  he  reads  well  a  prime  ele 
ment  of  Lincoln's  power  when  he  makes  distinction 
between  the  conscientiously  rigid  doctrinaire  and 


LOWELL  AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION   51 

the  statesman  who  achieves  his  triumph  by  quietly 
accomplishing  his  ends.  "  Mr.  Lincoln's  perilous 
task  has  been  to  carry  a  rather  shaky  raft  through 
the  rapids,  making  fast  the  unrulier  logs  as  he 
could  snatch  opportunity,  and  the  country  is  to  be 
congratulated  that  he  did  not  think  it  his  duty  to 
run  straight  at  all  hazards,  but  cautiously  to  assure 
himself  with  his  setting  pole  where  the  main  cur 
rent  was,  and  keep  steadily  to  that.  He  is  still  in 
wild  water,  but  we  have  faith  that  his  skill  and 
sureness  of  eye  will  bring  him  out  right  at  last." 
What  especially  bound  Lincoln's  policy  to  Lowell's 
confidence  was  the  fact  that  its  pole-star  was  na 
tional  integrity,  and  in  tracing  as  he  does  the  slow 
process  by  which  the  President  carried  the  nation 
with  him  till  the  abolition  of  slavery  became  no 
longer  the  cry  of  a  party  but  the  logical  necessity 
of  a  nation,  he  practically  unfolds  the  process  of 
his  own  development.1 

In  the  April  number  of  the  North  American 
Lowell  took  for  his  text  General  McClellan's  Re 
port,  and  applied  his  powers  of  analysis  to  this  for 
the  purpose  of  constructing  the  figure  of  Lincoln's 
opponent.  McClellan  was  no  longer  in  the  field, 
but  he  was  the  military  critic  of  the  administration 

1  In  a  letter  written  to  Mr.  R.  W.  Gilder,  7  February,  1887, 
Lowell  says :  "  I  spent  the  night  with  my  friend  Norton  last 
Wednesday.  There  I  found  a  pile  of  the  N.  A.  R.  .  .  .  By  the 
way  the  January,  '64,  number  was  '  second  edition.'  I  fancy  the 
old  lady  making-  her  best  curtsey  at  being  thus  called  out  before 
the  footlights.  The  article  was  reprinted  as  a  political  tract  and 
largely  circulated.  Lincoln  wrote  a  letter  to  the  publishers  which 
I  forgot  to  look  for." 


52  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

and  the  man  about  whom  the  forces  in  opposition 
were  gradually  collecting,  since  he  seemed  to  have 
been  thrown  up  for  this  purpose  by  the  elements 
which  were  most  active.  McClellan's  report,  which 
had  recently  appeared,  covered  the  period  from 
July,  1861,  to  November,  1862,  a  period  which  in 
the  rapid  progress  of  events  was  already  historical 
and  could  be  examined  in  the  light  of  later  move 
ments.  To  McClellan,  however,  the  Report  was  an 
apologia  pro  vita  sua,  and  nothing  had  happened 
since  it  was  written,  so  essentially  was  he  a  critic 
rather  than  a  creator.  Lowell  was  quick  to  see 
the  weakness  of  McClellan's  position  in  defending 
himself,  preliminary  to  assuming  a  position  where 
he  was  to  defend  the  country,  and  in  making  his 
defence  issue  in  charges  against  the  authority 
under  whose  orders  he  had  acted.  He  saw  not 
so  much  the  politician  under  the  soldier's  cloak  as 
a  man  of  such  calibre  as  fitted  him  to  become  the 
tool  of  politicians,  and  so  self-conscious  that  once 
he  is  possessed  of  the  notion  of  his  political  impor 
tance  he  looks  at  everything  from  a  personal  point 
of  view.  The  Report  gave  abundant  evidence  of 
this,  and  Lowell  follows  him  through  the  narra 
tive,  not  as  a  military  critic  but  as  a  student  of 
]  human  nature,  and  in  his  summary  asks  the  very 
pertinent  question  if  a  man  of  this  make-up  is  a 
man  to  put  at  the  head  of  affairs.  "  Though  we 
think,"  he  says,  "  great  injustice  has  been  done 
by  the  public  to  General  McClellan's  really  high 
merit  as  an  officer,  yet  it  seems  to  us  that  those 
very  merits  show  precisely  the  character  of  intel- 


LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION   53 

lect  to  unfit  him  for  the  task  just  now  demanded  of 
a  statesman.  His  capacity  for  organization  may 
be  conspicuous  ;  but  be  it  what  it  may,  it  is  one 
thing  to  bring  order  out  of  the  confusion  of  mere 
inexperience,  and  quite  another  to  retrieve  it  from 
a  chaos  of  elements  mutually  hostile,  which  is  the 
problem  sure  to  present  itself  to  the  next  adminis 
tration.  This  will  constantly  require  precisely  that 
judgment  on  the  nail,  and  not  to  be  drawn  for  at 
three  days'  sight,  of  which  General  McClellan  has 
shown  least.  Is  our  path  to  be  so  smooth  for  the 
next  four  years  that  a  man  whose  leading  charac 
teristic  is  an  exaggeration  of  difficulties  is  likely  to 
be  our  surest  guide  ?  .  .  .  The  man  who  is  fit  for 
the  office  of  President  in  these  times  should  be  one 
who  knows  how  to  advance,  an  art  which  General 
McClellan  has  never  learned." 

In  the  July  number  Lowell  recurs  more  dis 
tinctly  to  the  fundamental  questions  involved  in 
the  war,  since  his  task  is  to  place  in  comparison 
two  historical  works  issuing  from  opposite  sides, 
Pollard's  initial  volume  of  "  The  Southern  History 
of  the  War,"  devoted  to  the  first  year,  and  the  first 
volume  of  Greeley's  treatise,  "  The  American  Con 
flict."  As  these  two,  and  more  especially  the  lat 
ter,  naturally  set  about  accounting  for  the  war, 
Lowell  makes  them  the  text  for  his  article,  "  The 
Kebellion :  its  Causes  and  Consequences."  The 
breadth  of  the  theme  tempts  him  into  an  intro 
ductory  discussion  of  the  several  modes  of  writing 
history,  and  an  inquiry  into  the  spirit  in  which 
history  in  the  making  should  be  interpreted,  but 


54  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

his  real  business,  when  he  gets  at  it,  is  to  examine 
the  political  character  of  the  nation  at  the  breaking 
out  of  the  war,  and  to  trace  the  insidious  influence 
of  slavery  on  national  politics.  He  repeats  in 
newer  and  more  forcible  phrases  the  contention,  so 
often  made  by  him,  that  the  corruption  of  govern 
ment  had  been  going  on  steadily  under  this  subtle 
solvent,  and  that  the  hope  of  the  nation  was  in 
the  extinction  of  so  disturbing  an  element.  He 
applies  the  truth  to  the  political  situation  in  the 
approaching  election,  and  warns  the  South  that 
"  there  is  no  party  at  the  North,  considerable  in 
numbers  or  influence,  which  could  come  into  power 
on  the  platform  of  making  peace  with  the  Rebels 
on  their  own  terms.  No  party  can  get  possession 
of  the  government  which  is.  not  in  sympathy  with 
the  temper  of  the  people,  and  the  people,  forced 
into  war  against  their  will  by  the  unprovoked  at 
tack  of  pro-slavery  bigotry,  are  resolved  on  push 
ing  it  to  its  legitimate  conclusion.  War  means 
now,  consciously  with  many,  unconsciously  with 
most,  but  inevitably,  abolition.  ...  If  the  war  be 
waged  manfully,  as  becomes  a  thoughtful  people, 
without  insult  or  childish  triumph  in  success,  if  we 
meet  opinion  with  wiser  opinion,  waste  no  time  in 
badgering  prejudice  till  it  becomes  hostility,  and 
attack  slavery  as  a  crime  against  the  nation,  and 
not,  as  individual  sin,  it  will  end,  we  believe,  in 
making  us  the  most  powerful  and  prosperous  com 
munity  the  world  ever  saw." 

Though  he  wrote  hopefully  in  his  public  arti 
cles,  Lowell's  letters  show  alternations  of  hope  and 


LOWELL  AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE  UNION  55 

discouragement,  and  intimate  how  much  the  war 
disturbed  his  peace  of  mind.  He  wrote  to  Mr. 
Norton,  midway  between  the  July  and  October 
numbers  :  "  I  shall  say  nothing  about  politics,  my 
dear  Charles,  for  I  feel  rather  down  in  the  mouth, 
and  moreover  I  have  not  had  an  idea  so  long  that 
I  should  not  know  one  if  I  saw  it.  The  war  and 
its  constant  expectation  and  anxiety  oppress  me. 
I  cannot  think.  If  I  had  enough  to  leave  behind 
me,  I  could  enlist  this  very  day  and  get  knocked 
in  the  head.  I  hear  bad  things  about  Mr.  Lincoln 
and  try  not  to  believe  them." 

In  July  the  two  candidates  for  the  presidency 
had  not  been  formally  named,  but  when  Lowell 
came  to  prepare  his  article  for  the  October  num 
ber,  which  would  appear  on  the  eve  of  the  election, 
the  contest  was  at  its  height,  though  events  were 
rapidly  throwing  their  votes  against  the  losing 
party.  Lowell  makes  capital  use  of  this  fact  in 
his  article  "  McClellan  or  Lincoln  ?  "  which  gains 
in  wit  through  the  evident  elation  which  possesses 
the  writer  over  the  almost  certain  results.  He  had 
written  Motley  at  the  end  of  July  :  "  My  own  feel 
ing  has  always  been  confident,  and  it  is  now  hope 
ful.  If  Mr.  Lincoln  is  re-chosen,  I  think  the  war 
will  soon  be  over.  ...  So  far  as  I  can  see,  the 
opposition  to  Mr.  Lincoln  is  both  selfish  and  fac 
tious,  but  it  is  much  in  favor  of  the  right  side  that 
the  Democratic  party  have  literally  not  so  much 
as  a  single  plank  of  principle  to  float  on,  and  the 
sea  runs  high.  They  don't  know  what  they  are 
in  favor  of  —  hardly  what  they  think  it  safe  to  be 


56  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

against.  And  I  doubt  if  they  gain  much  by  going 
into  an  election  on  negatives."  By  a  series  of 
eliminations,  he  leaves,  in  his  article,  the  single 
point  of  difference  between  the  policy  of  Lincoln 
and  that  which  McClellan,  according  to  his  own 
showing,  would  pursue,  namely,  the  policy  of  con 
ciliation  concerning  which  McClellan  made  loud 
protestations  ;  and  then  he  proceeds  to  riddle  that 
assumption.  The  article,  however,  is  interesting 
chiefly  for  another  summary  of  Lowell's  judgment 
of  Lincoln :  — 

"  Mr.  Lincoln,  in  our  judgment,  has  shown  from 
the  first  the  considerate  wisdom  of  a  practical 
statesman.  If  he  has  been  sometimes  slow  in 
making  up  his  mind,  it  has  saved  him  the  neces 
sity  of  being  hasty  to  change  it  when  once  made 
up,  and  he  has  waited  till  the  gradual  movement 
of  the  popular  sentiment  should  help  him  to  his 
conclusions  and  sustain  him  in  them.  To  be  mod 
erate  and  unimpassioned  in  revolutionary  times 
that  kindle  natures  of  a  more  flimsy  texture,  may 
not  be  a  romantic  quality,  but  it  is  a  rare  one,  and 
goes  with  those  massive  understandings  on  which 
a  solid  structure  of  achievement  may  be  reared. 
Mr.  Lincoln  is  a  long-headed  and  long-purposed 
man,  who  knows  when  he  is  ready,  —  a  secret  Gen 
eral  McClellan  never  learned.  .  .  .  We  have  seen 
no  reason  to  change  our  opinion  of  Mr.  Lincoln 
since  his  wary  scrupulousness  won  him  the  applause 
of  one  party,  or  his  decided  action,  when  he  was  at 
last  convinced  of  its  necessity,  made  him  the  mo 
mentary  idol  of  the  other.  We  will  not  call  him  a 


LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    57 

great  man,  for  over-hasty  praise  is  too  apt  to  sour 
at  last  into  satire,  and  greatness  may  be  trusted 
safely  to  history  and  the  future ;  but  an  honest 
one  we  believe  him  to  be,  and  with  no  aim  save  to 
repair  the  glory  and  the  greatness  of  his  country." 

The  reelection  of  Lincoln  with  a  convincing  ma 
jority,  and  the  rapid  crushing  of  the  shell  of  the 
Confederacy,  conspired  at  once  to  give  Lowell  a 
spirit  of  exultation,  tempered  with  profound  regret, 
and  a  keen  interest  in  the  results  of  the  war.  The 
one  mood  appears  in  the  striking  paper  on  "  Re 
construction  "  which  he  contributed  to  the  North 
American  for  April,  1-865,  the  other  in  the  new 
"  Biglow  Paper  "  which  he  contributed  to  the  At 
lantic  for  the  same  month.  The  latter  was  written 
earlier  and  apparently  was  drawn  out  of  him  by  the 
golden  persuasion  of  Mr.  Fields,  for  we  find  Lowell 
writing  him  2  February,  1865,  when  he  sends  him 
No.  X.  of  the  "Biglow  Papers,"  "Mr.  Hosea 
Biglow  to  the  Editor  of  the  Atlantic  Monthly :  " 

"  You  pulled  the  string  of  this  cold  shower-bath^ 
so  you  can't  complain.  But  if  you  don't  like  it,  I 
am  willing  to  take  back  my  machine.  If  on  the 
other  hand  you  c?o,  —  and  if  you  don't,  by  Jove, 
count  on  my  undying  hate,  —  why,  suppose  you 
send  me  the  canvas  —  greenback,  I  mean,  before 
you  print  it.  This  would  give  us  both  a  sensation 
which  is  desirable  in  a  world  where  an  Emperor 
offered  a  kingdom  for  a  new  one.  Eemember  in 
future  that  asking  poets  for  verses  is  almost  as 
fatal  as  asking  them  to  read  them.  4  Thyself  art 
the  cause  of  this  anguish.'  Item.  I  have  been 


58  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

mulling  over  a  fairy  story,  of  which  something  may 
come  and  something  may  not.1  I  begin  to  suspect 
the  egg  may  be  chalk.  I  have  heard  of  such 
things.  Even  the  muses  in  this  degenerate  age 
have  learned  to  sophisticate.  The  devil  tempts  me 
to  tell  you  I  have  also  a  novel  in  progress,  and  an 
epic  poem  and  a  tragedy  —  also  a  satire  in  which 
those  who  don't  like  the  foregoing  are  ground  to 
powder.  But  I  have  scared  you  enough  for  once, 
and  I  really  have  n't  begun  one  of  'em,  unless  it 
may  be  the  tragedy  which  one  goes  on  composing 
all  his  life." 

The  ground-swell  of  emotion  which  stirs  the 
verses  written  in  that  winter  of  1865,  just  before 
spring  came,  and  when  the  buds  of  peace  were 
already  beginning  to  open,  is  expressive  of  that 
strong  personal  feeling  which  entered  into  Lowell's 
measure  of  the  sacrifice  which  had  been  made  when 
he  reckoned  on  the  great  gain  that  was  to  accrue 
to  the  nation.  Poetry,  and  especially  that  cast  in 
a  homely  mould,  was  his  vent  for  this  feeling.  He 
rarely  showed  emotion  in  his  prose,  but  in  the 
article  which  he  wrote  a  few  weeks  later  when  the 
end  was  just  in  sight,  he  discloses  in  another  way, 
and  almost  as  strongly,  the  depth  of  his  nature, 
for  in  this  article  on  "  Reconstruction "  there  is 
scarcely  any  of  that  play  of  wit  which  marks  his 
earlier  political  papers. 

"  Come,  while  our  country  feels  the  lift 

Of  a  gret  instinct  shoutin'  '  Forwards  !  '  " 

1  The  fairy  story  was  "  Gold-Eg-g :  a  Dream  Fantasy,"  which 
appeared  in  the  Atlantic  for  May,  1865. 


LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    59 

Hosea  Biglow  had  just  sung  with  tearful  eyes  and 
firm  set  lips,  and  Lowell's  whole  nature  seemed  to 
rise  in  an  eager  desire  to  grapple  with  the  great 
problem  which  was  to  confront  the  nation  as  soon 
as  the  last  gun  had  been  fired.  The  quiet,  stately 
opening  of  the  subject  as  he  recounts  with  deep 
pride  the  attitude  of  the  country,  and  the  splendid 
attestation  it  had  given  of  the  staying  power  of 
democracy,  is  followed  by  a  close  examination  of 
the  main  lines  of  policy  to  be  followed  in  the  re 
construction  of  the  insurgent  states.  "  We  did 
not  enter,"  he  says,  "  upon  war  to  open  a  new 
market,  or  fresh  fields  for  speculators,  or  an  outlet 
for  redundant  population,  but  to  save  the  experi 
ment  of  democracy  from  destruction,  and  put  it  in 
a  fairer  way  of  success  by  removing  the  single  dis 
turbing  element.  Our  business  now  is  not  to  allow 
ourselves  to  be  turned  aside  from  a  purpose  which 
our  experience  thus  far  has  demonstrated  to  have 
been  as  wise  as  it  was  necessary,  and  to  see  to  it 
that,  whatever  be  the  other  conditions  of  recon 
struction,  democracy,  which  is  our  real  strength, 
receive  no  detriment." 

Hence,  after  some  wise  words  regarding  the 
treatment  of  the  governing  class  at  the  South,  and 
a  penetrating  exposition  of  the  relation  between 
these  and  the  non  -  slaveholding  class,  he  applies 
himself  most  closely  to  a  study  of  the  situation  as 
regards  the  blacks,  with  the  conclusion  that  the 
prime  necessity  is  to  make  them  land-holders  and 
to  give  them  the  ballot.  There  are  some  sentences 
which  have  a  mournful  sound  read  to-day,  thirty- 


60  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

five  years  after  the  discussion.  "  We  believe  the 
white  race,  by  their  intellectual  and  traditional 
superiority,  will  retain  sufficient  ascendancy  to  pre 
vent  any  serious  mischief  from  the  new  order  of 
things."  "As  to  any  prejudices  which  should  pre 
vent  the  two  races  from  living  together,  it  would 
soon  yield  to  interest  and  necessity."  He  is  aware 
of  the  difficulties  which  beset  the  subject,  but  he 
contends  that  the  large  way  is  the  only  way.  "  If 
we  are  to  try  the  experiment  of  democracy  fairly, 
it  must  be  tried  in  its  fullest  extent,  and  not  half 
way.  .  .  .  The  opinion  of  the  North  is  made  up 
on  the  subject  of  emancipation,  and  Mr.  Lincoln 
has  announced  it  as  the  one  essential  preliminary 
to  the  readmission  of  the  insurgent  States.  To  our 
mind,  citizenship  is  the  necessary  consequence,  as 
it  is  the  only  effectual  warranty,  of  freedom  ;  and 
accordingly  we  are  in  favor  of  distinctly  settling 
beforehand  some  conditional  right  of  admission  to 
it.  We  have  purposely  avoided  any  discussion  on 
gradualism  as  an  element  in  emancipation,  because 
we  consider  its  evil  results  to  have  been  demon 
strated  in  the  British  West  Indies.  True  con 
servative  policy  is  not  an  anodyne  hiding  away  our 
evil  from  us  in  a  brief  forgetfulness.  It  looks  to 
the  long  future  of  a  nation,  and  dares  the  heroic 
remedy  where  it  is  scientifically  sure  of  the  nature 
of  the  disease." 

Then  came  the  triumphant  close  in  the  surrender 
of  Lee,  and  he  writes  to  Mr.  Norton  :  "  The  news, 
my  dear  Charles,  is  from  Heaven.  I  felt  a  strange 
and  tender  exaltation.  I  wanted  to  laugh  and  I 


LOWELL  AND   THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    61 

wanted  to  cry,  and  ended  by  holding  my  peace  and 
feeling  devoutly  thankful.  There  is  something 
magnificent  in  having  a  country  to  love.  It  is 
almost  like  what  one  feels  for  a  woman.  Not  so 
tender,  perhaps,  but  to  the  full  as  self-forgetful. 
I  worry  a  little  about  reconstruction,  but  am  in 
clined  to  think  that  matters  will  very  much  settle 
themselves."  He  closed  his  political  articles  of  the 
war  period  with  one  in  July,  entitled  "  Scotch  the 
Snake,  or  kill  it  ?  "  which  is  in  a  lighter  vein  than 
"  Reconstruction,"  and  is  in  its  way  a  quick  sur 
vey  of  the  underlying  character  of  the  great  con 
test,  suggested  by  an  examination  of  that  scrap- 
book  of  the  war,  Frank  Moore's  The  Rebellion 
Record.  This  mirror  gives  so  many  varied  reflec 
tions  that  Lowell  writes_a_Iittle  at  random,  making 
felicitous  comments,  but  coming  back,  as  so  often 
before,  to  the  paramount  question  of  slavery  and 
the  treatment  of  the  negro.  As  the  title  of  his 
article  intimates,  he  contendsjor  a  radical  solution 
of  the  problem.  "  The  more  thought  we  bestow  on 
the  matter,  the  more  thoroughly  are  we  persuaded 
that  the  only  way  to  get  rid  of  the  negro  is  to  do 
him  justice.  Democracy  is  safe  because  it  is  just, 
and  safe  only  when  it  is  just  to  all.  Here  is  no  \ 
question  of  white  or  black,  but  simply  of  man.  ' 
We  have  hitherto  been  strong  in  proportion  as  we 
dared  be  true  to  the  sublime  thought  of  our  own 
Declaration  of  Independence,  which  for  the  first 
time  proposed  to  embody  Christianity  in  human 
laws,  and  announced  the  discovery  that  the  security 
of  the  state  is  based  on  the  moral  instinct  and  the 
manhood  of  its  members." 


62  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

The  character  of  the  work  he  was  noticing  led 
him  at  the  beginning  of  his  paper  into  some  reflec 
tions  on  the  part  played  by  newspapers  in  modern 
times,  and  the  stimulus  given  to  national  sensitive 
ness  by  the  quick  transmission  of  news.  "  It  is  no 
trifling  matter,"  he  says,  "  that  thirty  millions  of 
men  should  be  thinking  the  same  thought  and  feel 
ing  the  same  pang  at  a  single  moment  of  time,  and 
that  these  vast  parallels  of  latitude  should  become 
a  neighborhood  more  intimate  than  many  a  coun 
try  village.  The  dream  of  Human  Brotherhood 
seems  to  be  coming  true  at  last.  The  peasant  who 
dipped  his  net  in  the  Danube,  or  trapped  the 
beaver  on  its  banks,  perhaps  never  heard  of  Caesar, 
or  of  Caesar's  murder ;  but  the  shot  that  shattered 
the  forecasting  brain,  and  curdled  the  warm,  sweet 
heart  of  the  most  American  of  Americans,  echoed 
along  the  wires  through  the  length  and  breadth  of 
a  continent,  swelling  all  eyes  at  once  with  tears  of 
indignant  sorrow.  Here  was  a  tragedy  fulfilling 
the  demands  of  Aristotle,  and  purifying  with  an 
instantaneous  throb  of  pity  and  terror  a  theatre  of 
such  proportions  as  the  world  never  saw.  We 
doubt  if  history  ever  recorded  an  event  so  touch 
ing  and  awful  as  this  sympathy,  so  wholly  eman 
cipated  from  the  toils  of  space  and  time  that  it 
might  seem  as  if  earth  were  really  sentient,  as 
some  have  dreamed,  or  the  great  god  Pan  alive 
again  to  make  the  hearts  of  nations  stand  still  with 
his  shout.  What  is  Beethoven's  '  Funeral  March 
for  the  Death  of  a  Hero '  to  the  symphony  of  love, 
pity,  and  wrathful  resolve  which  the  telegraph  of 


LOWELL  AND  THE   WAR  FOR  THE   UNION    63 

that  April  morning  played  on  the  pulses  of  a  na 
tion?" 

It  was  perhaps  with  one  of  these  phrases  linger 
ing  in  his  mind  that  he  characterized  Lincoln  a 
few  weeks  later  when  he  came  to  write  his  Ode 
recited  at  the  Harvard  Commemoration.  This 
commemoration  was  held  by  Harvard  College^_21 
July,J.865,  in  honor  of  its  sons  who  had  died  in 
the  war.  Lowell  was  asked  to  write  a  poem  for 
the  occasion,  and  he  has  given  in  a  letter  written  a 
score  of  years  later,  to  Mr.  Gilder,  a  bit  of  remi 
niscence  respecting  its  composition.  "  The  ode  it 
self,"  he  says,  "  was  an  improvisation.  Two  days 
before  the  commemoration  I  had  told  my  friend 
Child  that  it  was  impossible  —  that  I  was  dull  as  a 
door-mat.  But  the  next  day  something  gave  me 
a  jog,  and  the  whole  thing  came  out  of  rne  with  a 
rush.  I  sat  up  all  night  writing  it  out  clear,  and 
took  it  on  the  morning  of  the  day  to  Child.  '  I 
have  something  but  don't  yet  know  what  it  is,  or 
whether  it  will  do.  Look  at  it  and  tell  me.'  He 
went  a  little  way  apart  with  it  under  an  elm-tree 
in  the  College  yard.  He  read  a  passage  here  and 
there,  brought  it  back  to  me,  and  said  '  Do  ?  I 
should  think  so !  Don't  you  be  scared  ! '  And  I 
was  n't,  but  virtue  enough  had  gone  out  of  me  to 
make  me  weak  for  a  fortnight  after."  Something 
of  this  reaction  appears  in  a  letter  to  Miss  Norton, 
written  four  days  after  the  delivery  of  the  poem : 
"  I  eat  and  smoke  and  sleep  and  go  through  all 
the  nobler  functions  of  a  man  mechanically  still, 
and  wonder  at  myself  as  at  something  outside  of 


64  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

and  alien  to  me.  For  have  I  not  worked  myself 
lean  on  an  '  Q^le^Jor  Commemoration  ? '  Was  I 
not  so  rapt  with  the  fervor  of  conception  as  I  have 
not  been  these  ten  years,  losing  my  sleep,  my  ap 
petite,  and  my  flesh,  those  attributes  to  which  I 
before  alluded  as  nobly  uniting  us  in  a  common 
nature  with  our  kind?  Did  I  not  for  two  days 
exasperate  everybody  that  came  near  me  by  recit 
ing  passages  in  order  to  try  them  on  ?  Did  I  not 
even  fall  backward  and  downward  to  the  old  folly 
of  hopeful  youth,  and  think  I  had  written  some 
thing  really  good  at  last?  And  am  I  not  now 
enduring  those  retributive  dumps  which  ever  fol 
low  such  sinful  exaltations,  the  Erynnyes  of  Van 
ity  ?  Did  not  I  make  John  Holmes  and  William 
V)Story  shed  tears  by  my  recitation  of  it  (my  ode) 
in  the  morning,  both  of  'em  fervently  declaring  it 
was  '  noble '  ?  Did  not  even  the  silent  Kowse  de 
clare  't  was  in  a  higher  mood  than  much  or  most 
of  later  verse  ?  Did  not  I  think,  in  my  nervous 
exhilaration,  that  't  would  be  the  feature  (as  re 
porters  call  it)  of  the  day  ?  And,  after  all,  have 
I  not  a  line  in  the  Daily  Advertiser  calling  it  a  \ 
'  graceful  poem '  (or  '  some  graceful  verses '  I  forget 
which),  which  '  was  received  with  applause  ? '  Why, 
Jane,  my  legs  are  those  of  grasshoppers,  and  my 
head  is  an  autumn  threshing-floor,  still  beating 
with  the  alternate  flails  of  strophe  and  antistrophe, 
and  an  infinite  virtue  is  gone  out  of  me  somehow 
-  but  it  seems  not  into  my  verse  as  I  dreamed. 
Well,  well,  Charles  will  like  it  —  but  then  he  al 
ways  does,  so  what 's  the  use  ?  I  am  Icarus  now, 


Facsimile  of  Mr.  Lowell'' *s  handwriting 


66  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

narrowness  in  it  as  an  expression  of  the  popular 
feeling  as  well  as  my  own.  I  confess  I  have  never 
got  over  the  feeling  of  wrath  with  which  (just  after 
the  death  of  my  nephew  Willie)  I  read  in  an  Eng 
lish  paper  that  nothing  was  to  be  hoped  of  an  army 
officered  by  tailors'  apprentices  and  butcher  boys. 
The  poem  was  written  with  a  vehement  speed, 
which  I  thought  I  had  lost  in  the  skirts  of  my  pro 
fessor's  gown.  Till^ithin  two  days  of  the  cele 
bration  I  was  hopelessly  dumb,  and  then  it  all 
came  with  a  rush,  literally  making  me  lean  (mi 
fece  magro),  and  so  nervous  that  I  was  weeks  in 
getting  over  it.  I  was  longer  in  getting  the  new 
(eleventh)  strophe  to  my  mind  than  in  writing  the 
rest  of  my  poem.  In  that  I  hardly  changed  a  word, 
and  it  was  so  undeli berate  that  I  did  not  find  out 
till  after  it  was  printed  that  some  of  the  verses 
lacked  corresponding  rhymes.1  ...  I  had  put  the 
ethical  and  political  view  so  often  in  prose  that  I 
was  weary  of  it.  The  motives  of  the  war  ?  I  had 
impatiently  urged  them  again  and  again,  —  but  for 
an  ode  they  must  be  in  the  blood  and  not  the  mem 
ory.  One  of  my  great  defects  (I  have  always  been 
conscious  of  it)  is  an  impatience  of  mind  which 
makes  me  contemptuously  indifferent  about  argu 
ing  matters  that  have  once  become  convictions." 

Once  more,  in  writing  to  the  same  correspondent 
in  1877,  with  regard  to  the  versification,  he  says : 
"  My  problem  was  to  contrive  a  measure  which 

1  Lowell  writes  again  of  this  and  makes  proposed  changes  and 
additions  in  a  letter  to  Col.  T.  W.  Higginson,  28  March,  1867. 
See  Letters,  i.  379. 


LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    67 

should  not  be  tedious  by  uniformity,  which  should 
vary  with  varying  moods,  in  which  the  transitions 
(including  those  of  the  voice)  should  be  managed 
without  jar.  I  at  first  thought  of  mixed  rhymed 
and  blank  verses  of  unequal  measures,  like  those 
in  the  choruses  of  '  Samson  Agonistes,'  which  are  in 
the  main  masterly.  Of  course  Milton  deliberately 
departed  from  that  stricter  form  of  the  Greek 
Chorus  to  which  it  was  bound -as  much  (I  suspect) 
by  the  law  of  its  musical  accompaniment  as  by  any 
sense  of  symmetry.  I  wrote  some  stanzas  of  the 
4  Commemoration  Ode '  on  this  theory  at  first, 
leaving  some  verses  without  a  rhyme  to  match. 
But  my  ear  was  better  pleased  with  the  rhyme, 
coming  at  a  longer  interval,  as  a  far-off  echo, 
rather  than  instant  reverberation,  produced  the 
same  effect  almost,  and  yet  was  grateful  by  unex 
pectedly  recalling  an  association  and  faint  reminis 
cence  of  consonance."  1 


1  There  was  a  curious  psychical  incident  connected  with  the 
delivery  of  the  Ode  which  came  to  light  afterward  but  apparently 
was  not  recorded  till  several  years  later.  The  incident  is  fully  set 
forth  in  two  letters  to  Dr.  William  James,  which  were  published 
in  the  Proceedings  of  the  American  Society  for  Psychical  Research, 
March,  1889,  where  Dr.  Royce  printed  a  "  Report  of  the  Com 
mittee  on  Phantasms  and  Presentiments."  The  first  letter  is  from 
the  gentleman  in  whose  experience  the  incident  occurred :  — 

MY  DEAR  MR.  JAMES,  —  I  passed  the  night  before  commemo 
ration  day  on  a  lounge  in  Hollis  21,  the  room  of  my  college  chum 
H.,  who  had  been  tutor  since  our  graduation,  three  years  before. 
I  woke  (somewhat  early,  I  should  say)  saying  to  myself  these 
words  :  "  And  what  they  dare  to  dream  of  dare  to  die  for."  I 
was  enough  awake  to  notice  the  appropriateness  of  the  words  to 
the  occasion,  but  was  sleepy  enough  to  wonder  whether  they 


68  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

The  ode  did  at  once  assert  its  high  character, 
I/yet  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  very  reason 

really  expressed  a  lofty  thought,  or  were  lofty  only  in  sound. 
Before  I  had  made  up  my  mind  I  dropped  to  sleep  again. 

In  the  afternoon  I  was  in  about  the  middle  of  the  tent.  Mr. 
Lowell  stood  under  Hollis  at  nearly  the  same  table.  I  heard 
very  distinctly  as  he  read  "  Those  love  her  best."  I  felt  that 
something  was  coming  which  was  familiar,  and  as  he  ended  the 
line  I  felt  that  I  could  repeat  the  next  one,  and  I  did  so,  ahead 
of  him.  But  as  we  proceeded  I  was  confounded  with  the  fact 
that  apparently  my  line  would  not  rhyme  with  his.  As  I  said 
"  die  for,"  he  said  "  do."  I  spent  some  minutes  in  trying  to  de 
termine  whether  I  liked  his  sentiment  or  mine  the  most. 

That  is  all.  After  twenty-one  years,  details  are  dim.  Some 
years  ago,  just  before  Mr.  Lowell  sailed  for  England,  I  sent  him 
a  statement,  more  detailed  probably  than  this ;  but  no  doubt  it 
became  carbonic  acid  and  water  before  he  left  the  house. 

The  second  letter  is  from  Lowell,  to  whom  Mr.  W.'s  letter  had 

been  sent  by  Dr.  James  :  — 

17th  Feb.,  1888. 

DEAR  DR.  JAMES,  —  My  Commemoration  Ode  was  very  rapidly 
written,  and  came  to  me  unexpectedly,  for  I  had  told  Child,  who 
was  one  of  the  committee  (I  suppose),  that  he  must  look  for  no 
thing  from  me.  I  sat  up  all  the  night  before  the  ceremony,  writ 
ing  and  copying  out  what  I  had  written  during  the  day.  I  think 
most  of  it  was  composed  on  that  last  day.  I  have  no  doubt  the 
verse  quoted  by  Mr.  W.  came  to  me  in  a  flash,  but  whether  dur 
ing  that  last  night  or  not  I  cannot  say.  Perhaps  my  MS.  would 
show,  if  I  had  kept  it,  or  if  anybody  else  has.  Child  will  remem 
ber  my  taking  him  apart  under  an  elm,  between  Massachusetts 
and  the  Law  School,  that  morning,  that  I  might  read  him  a  part 
of  the  Ode,  to  see  if  it  would  do,  for  't  was  so  fresh  that  I  knew  not, 
having  probably  not  even  had  time  to  read  it  over.  It  was  such  a 
new  thing  in  more  senses  than  one. 

I  recollect  Mr.  W.'s  letter,  and  think  it  was  substantially  like 
that  to  you.  I  did  not  burn  it,  I  am  sure,  and  't  will,  no  doubt, 
turn  up  somewhere  in  my  hay-stack  of  letters  when  I  am  "  up 
back  of  the  meetin'-house,"  as  Yankees  used  to  say  while  there 
were  any  Yankees  left.  .  .  . 

There  is  one  painful  suggestion  in  the  fact  of  Mr.  W.'s  antici- 


LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    69 

of  its  form  acted  somewhat  against  its  immediate 
popularity.  It  is  truly  an  ode  to  be  recited,  and 
as  a  chorus  depends  for  its  power  upon  a  volume 
of  sound,  so  this  ode  needs,  to  bring  out  its  full 
value,  a  great  delivery.  Lowell  himself,  always  a 
sympathetic  reader,  had  no  such  power  of  recita 
tion  as  would  at  once  convey  to  his  audience  a 
notion  of  the  stateliness  and  procession  of  words 
which  attaches  to  the  ode.  The  impression  of  the 
hour  was  produced  by  the  spontaneous  outpouring 
of  thejiear^o^Phillips  Brooks  in  prayer.  "  That," 
says  President  Eliot,  "  was  the  most  impressive  \ 
utterance  of  a  proud  and  happy  day.  Even  Low 
ell's  Commemoration  Ode  did  not  at  the  moment 
so  touch  the  hearts  of  his  hearers ;  that  one  spon- 
taneous  and  intimate  expression  of  -Brooks's  noble 
sjDirit^  convinced  all  Harvard  men  that  a  young 
prophet  had  risen  up  in  Israel,"  l 

Lowell's  explanation  of  the  form  of  the  ode  is 
significant.  So  native  to  him  was  the  most  genu 
ine  literary  spirit  that  he  could  conceive  of  the  ode 
and  its  delivery  as  one  consistent  whole  without 
being  perturbed  by  the  consideration  that  he  was 
to  deliver  it  and  to  a  modern  audience  trained  in 
the  reading  of  poetry,  not  in  the  hearing  of  it. 

pation,  which  I  hardly  venture  to  speak  of.     Was  the  verse  al 
ready  do  ?     Did  I  steal  it  ?     Not  to  my  knowledge  ;  but  perhaps 
it  might  be  well  to  set  a  literary  detective  on  my  trail. 
I  return  the  letter. 

Faithfully  yours, 

J.  R.  LOWELL. 

1  Quoted  by  A.  V.  G.  Allen  in  his  Life  and  Letters  of  Phillips 
Brooks,  i.  552. 


70  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Both  the  poetic  reciter  and  the  recipients  were 
wanting,  and  the  ode  remains,  a  noble  piece  of 
declamation  indeed  for  whoever  has  the  great  gift 
of  poetic  declamation,  yet  after  all  as  surely  to  be 
read  and  not  spoken  as  Browning's  dramas  are  to 
be  read  and  not  acted.  It  is  this  fine  literary 
sense,  penetrating  even  to  a  supposititious  occasion, 
which  clings  to  the  ode  and  makes  it  so  far  caviare 
to  the  general.  Yet  it  would  be  false  indeed  to 
regard  such  a  statement  as  final.  The  fire  which 
burned  in  Lowell's  members,  leaving  him  cold 
afterward,  glows  in  the  great  lines,  and  certain  it 
is  that  at  no  other  single  poem,  unless  it  be  Whit 
man's  "  My  Captain,"  does  the  young  American 
of  the  generation  born  since  the  war  so  kindle  his 
patriotic  emotions. 

The  sixth  stanza  was  not  recited,  but  was  written 
immediately  afterward.  It  is  so  completely  im 
bedded  in  the  structure  of  the  ode  that  it  is  diffi 
cult  to  think  of  it  as  an  afterthought.  It  is  easy 
to  perceive  that  while  the  glow  of  composition  and 
of  recitation  was  still  upon  him  Lowell  suddenly 
conceived  this  splendid  illustration  and  indeed  cli 
max  of  the  utterance  of  the  Ideal  which  is  so 
impressive  in  the  fifth  stanza.  \So  free,  so  spon 
taneous  is  this  characterization  of  Lincoln,  and  so 
concrete  in  thought,  that  it  has  been  most  fre- 
quently^-ead,  we  suspect,  of  any  single  portion  of 
the  ode,  and  it  is  so  eloquent  that  one  likes  to 
fancy  the  whole  force  of  the  ode  behind  it,  as  if 
Lowell  needed  the  fire  he  had  fanned  to  white 
heat,  for  the  very  purpose  of  forging  this  last,  firm 
tempered  bit  of  steel. 


LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION     71 

Into  these  threescore  lines  Lowell  has  poured  a 
conception  of  Lincoln  which  may  justly  be  said  to 
be  to-day  the  accepted  idea  which  Americans  hold 
of  their  great  President.  It  was  the  final  expres 
sion  of  the  judgment  which  had  slowly  been  form 
ing  in  Lowell's  own  mind,  and  when  he  summed 
him  up  in  his  last  line,  — 

"  New  birth  of  our  new  soil,  the  first  American," 

^Hk  was  honestly  throwing  away  all  the  doubts 
which  had  from  time  to  time*  beset  him,  and  letting 
his  »rdent  pursuit  of  the  ideal,  his  profound  faith 
in  democracy  as  incarnate  in  his  country,  centre  in 
this  on$  man. 

v  In  April,  1887,  the  Century  Magazine  had  a 
brief  article  headed  "  Lincoln  and  Lowell,"  in 
which  the  editor,  quoting  the  pregnant  sentence  on 
Lincoln  from  Lowell's  recently  published  address 
on  "  Democracy,"  is  reminded  that  Lowell  "  was 
the  first  of  the  leading  American  writers  to  see 
clearly  and  fully,  and  clearly  and  fully  and  enthu 
siastically  proclaim  the  greatness  of  Abraham  Lin 
coln."  And  after  quoting  this  sixth  stanza  of  the 
ode,  he  goes  back  and  recalls  the  political  papers 
in  the  Atlantic  and  North  American  Review,  with 
their  references  to  Lincoln  which  we  have  already 
noted.  The  next  number  of  the  Century  contained 
an  article  in  the  nature  of  a  postscript,  citing  the 
early  judgment  of  Emerson  also  on  the  President. 
In  publishing  Nicolay  and  Hay's  "Life  of  Lin 
coln  "  in  the  magazine,  the  editor  naturally  was 
interested  to  recover  the  impression  made  by  Lin- 


72  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

coin  when  he  was  comparatively  an  untried  man, 
on  the  poets  and  seers,  who  have  a  clearer  divina 
tion  than  politicians.  He  was  in  correspondence 
with  Lowell  and  wished  if  he  could  to  learn  what 
Longfellow  and  Whittier  had  then  said. 

Lowell  replied  under  date  of  7  February,  1887 : 
"  I  can  recollect  nothing  about  Lincoln  by  either 
L.  or  W.,  though  this  would  prove  nothing.  I  do 
remember  a  debate  with  Dr.  Holmes  just  after 
Lincoln's  nomination.  It  was  under  the  elms  in 
front  of  the  old  Holmes  house  (where  he  took  a 
photograph  of  me  by  O.  W.  H.  and  Sun),  and  he 
was  much  exercised  in  mind  because  Seward  had 
not  been  the  man.  I,  who  had  read  Lincoln's 
speeches,  was  entirely  content."  The  extracts 
which  I  have  given  from  Lowell's  letters  and 
essays  make  it,  however,  quite  clear  that  the  full 
recognition  of  Lincoln's  greatness  was  a  growth 
and  not  an  immediate  insight.  Nor  is  this  strange. 
Lowell  never  saw  Lincoln.  Had  he  met  him  early 
in  his  career,  and  enjoyed  the  advantage  which 
comes  from  personal  sight,  as  Hawthorne  for  ex 
ample  did,  there  is  little  doubt  that  he  would  have 
borne  away  from  the  interview  the  impression 
which  was  stamped  on  so  many  ingenuous  minds, 
and  he  would  have  read  the  President's  utterances 
by  the  light  of  that  illuminating  countenance. 
That  Lowell  did  not  at  once  throw  away  all  doubts 
and  accept  Lincoln  at  the  valuation  he  later  placed 
upon  him  was  due  to  the  facts  that  Lincoln  re 
vealed  himself  only  by  degrees  in  his  speech  and 
act,  and  that  while  he  was  then  making  himself 


LOWELL  AND  THE  WAR  FOR  THE  UNION    73 

known  Lowell  was  cherishing  an  ideal  of  his  coun 
try  and  its  destiny  which  called  for  the  loftiest 
expression  of  patriotism.  He  was  above  all  eager 
for  a  demonstration  of  high  courage  and  fearless 
insistence  upon  national  supremacy,  when  the  coun 
try  seemed  rocking  with  inconstancy.  That  he 
should  confess  in  Lincoln  the  "  new  American " 
was  an  evidence  that  the  pure  idealism  which  had 
marked  Lowell's  political  thinking  and  writing,  an 
idealism  moreover  conjoined  with  shrewd  practical 
sense,  had  at  last  found,  to  his  profound  satisfac 
tion,  a  great  exemplar,  and  the  life  and  death  of 
this  wonderful  product  of  the  American  soil  pre 
saged  for  him  the  development  of  a  race  of  free 
men. 


CHAPTER   XI 

POETKY   AND    PROSE 

1858-1872 

LOWELL'S  writing  during  the  war,  and  very 
largely  also  during  the  four  previous  years  in 
which  he  had  been  engaged  on  the  Atlantic,  was 
mainly  of  a  political  character,  and  it  has  seemed 
best  not  to  interrupt  the  record  with  much  refer 
ence  to  his  other  writings  and  his  pursuits  gener 
ally  during  these  eight  years.  But  though  he  felt 
keenly  the  great  movement  which  was  breaking  up 
the  old  union  and  making  way  for  the  new  and 
greater  union,  he  was  too  established  in  his  own 
order  of  life  tospermit  that  to  undergo  any  violent 
change.  Even  in  his  political  writing,  as  we  have 
seen,  he  was  first  of  all  a  man  of  letters,  with  an 
imaginative  foresight ;  his  occupation  both  as  a 
teacher  and  an  editor  gave  a  certain  steadying 
force  to  his  powers,  so  that  though  he  rebelled 
against  the  irksomeness  of  routine  he  was  deliv 
ered  from  what  might  have  been  the  waywardness 
of  a  too  self-centred  life. 

His  safety-valve  during  all  this  period  was  in 
his  letters  to  his  familiar  friends,  as  it  was  also  in 
the  free  talk  which  he  held  with  them  ;  and  this, 
even  though  he  chafed  under  restraint  and  pres- 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  75 

sure  which  seemed  to  him  to  lessen  his 'spontaneity. 
"  How  malicious  you  are,"  he  writes  to  Miss  Nor 
ton,  23  October,  1858,  "about  what  I  said  of 
women's  being  good  letter  writers  !  What  I  meant 
was  that  they  wrote  more  unconsciously  than  we 
do.  I  don't  know  how  it  is  with  other  folks,  but 
I  cannot  sit  down  now  and  write  a  letter  as  if  I 
were  talking.  Good  writing,  I  take  it,  can  only 
result  from  necessity  of  expression,  and  an  author 
satisfies  that  in  so  many  ways  that  his  letters  are 
apt  to  be  dull. 

"  I  like  '  Miles  Standish '  better  than  you  do. 
I  think  it  in  some  respects  the  best  long  poem  L. 
has  written.  It  is  so  simple  and  picturesque, 
and  the  story  is  not  encumbered  with  unavailing 
description,  which  is  a  fault  in  '  Evangeline.'  But 
I  quite  agree  with  you  about  the  metre.  It  is  too 
deceitfully  easy. 

"  One  might  begin  at  dawn  nor  end  till  the  purple  twilight, 
Stringing  verses  at  will,  nor  know  it  was  verse  he  was  stringing. 
This  is  the  modern  way,  the  way  of  steamer  and  railroad 
Where  all  the  work  is  done,  you  scarcely  know  how,  by  the 

Engine. 
Ah,  but  the  Hill  of  Fame,  can  they  dig  it  down  ?  can  they  grade 

it? 

Difficult  always  is  Good,  and  he,  I  guess,  who  attains  it 
Starts  with  two  feet  and  a  staff  and  bread  for  To-day  in  his 

wallet, 
Footsore  dropping  at  last,  repaid  by  long  hope  of  the  summit." 

His  college  duties  he  performed  with  conscien 
tious  fidelity,  and  he  found  at  times  a  genuine  sat 
isfaction  in  the  free  intercourse  with  his  students 
over  great  subjects,  yet  he  could  not  always  over 
look  the  immaturity  of  his  pupils,  and  he  was  im- 


76  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

patient  at  the  sort  of  work  outside  of  direct  teach 
ing  which  falls  to  the  lot  of  college  professors. 
The  task  of  lecturing  itself  was  sure  to  suggest  the 
incompleteness  of  expression,  and  so  offend  all  his 
genius  as  a  writer.  "  Yesterday,"  he  writes  to 
Miss  Norton,  in  the  fall  of  1859,  u  I  began  my  lec 
tures.  I  came  off  better  than  I  expected,  for  I  am 
always  a  great  coward  beforehand.  I  hate  lectur 
ing,  for  I  have  discovered  (entre  nous)  that  it  is 
almost  impossible  to  learn  all  about  anything,  un 
less,  indeed,  it  be  some  piece  of  ill-luck,  and  then 
one  has  the  help  of  one's  friends,  you  know.  .  .  . 
I  am  trying  to  reform  the  Spanish  and  Italian 
classes.  Charles  would  be  astonished  to  hear  me 
read  the  Castilian  tongue,  now  wellnigh  as  familiar 
to  me  as  Castilian  soap.  If  he  would  n't  be,  /  am. 
I  am  about  as  much  '  Spanish,'  tell  him,  c  as  a  Con 
necticut  segar.' " 

At  the  same  time  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Norton :  "  I 
am  busier  than  ever,  and,  I  fear,  fruitlessly.  My 
Italian  class  are  half  of  them  drones,  and  this 
hinders  my  getting  on  as  I  would  with  the  rest.  I 
am  studying  Spanish,  as  I  did  German  in  Dresden, 
reading  it  in  all  my  leisure  time,  and  before  long 
mean  to  make  myself  thorough  in  it.  At  forty  a 
man  learns  fast.  My  Spanish  class  is  a  very  good 
one.  There  are  only  five,  and  they  all  do  their 
best.  Vacare  musis  —  what  does  that  mean  ?  I 
have  almost  forgotten." 

"  I  champ  the  bit  sometimes  here,"  he  writes  to 
the  same  a  year  later,  "  but  God's  will  be  done ! 
Ancora  imparo,  though  I  be  in  a  go-cart.  My 


POETRY   AND   PROSE  7? 

Spanish  recitations  cost  me  some  time  and  trouble 
as  yet,  for  I  make  the  students  parse  and  construe 
with  never-failing  strictness.  For  this  I  have  to 
study  the  grammar  harder  than  any  of  them,  for 
my  Italian  is  always  in  my  way  with  its  slightly 
differing  forms.  However,  I  have  learned  more 
already  than  I  should  have  thought  possible  a  year 
ago,  and  I  think  some  of  the  students  seem  to  be 
interested." 

Now  and  then  he  could  make  his  college  work 
and  his  Atlantic  work  play  into  each  other,  but 
not  often.  "  I  have  as  yet  only  dipped  into  your 
last  four  volumes,"  he  writes  12  June,  1860,  to 
E.  G.  White,  "  and  those  I  keep  for  the  same  good 
time  (i.  e.  vacation).  I  have  to  prepare  some  lec 
tures  on  Shakespeare,  and  shall  kill  two  birds  with 
one  stone  by  making  use  of  your  edition,  and  so 
enabling  myself  to  write  an  intelligent  notice  of  it 
for  the  Atlantic" 

The  Atlantic  itself  gave  him  an  agreeable 
change  from  his  class-room  duties,  even  if  it  took 
him  along  somewhat  the  same  road  as  when, 
shortly  after  he  undertook  it,  he  received  a  contri 
bution  from  Sainte-Beuve  on  Beranger,  and  trans 
lated  it  for  the  number  for  February,  1858.  Two 
months  later  he  began  that  series  of  criticisms  on 
the  successive  volumes  of  Smith's  "  Library  of  Old 
English  Authors,"  which  he  completed  in  the 
North  American  ten  years  afterward,  and  com 
bined  into  the  long  paper  printed  in  the  first  vol 
ume  of  his  "  Literary  Essays."  As  an  instance  of 
minute  detective  work  in  criticism,  the  article  is 


7%  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

noteworthy,  but  we  suspect  that  his  readers  to-day 
pass  lightly  over  the  scoring  of  Hazlitt's  editorship 
to  read  the  brilliant  characterizations  of  Eliza 
bethan  poets  and  dramatists,  which  crop  out  of  the 
stony  soil  of  textual  criticism.  In  writing  these 
articles  Lowell  was  recurring  to  subjects  which  had, 
as  we  have  seen,  unfailing  interest  for  him,  and 
one  cannot  compare  these  notes  on  Chapman, 
Webster,  Marlowe,  and  others  with  the  observa 
tions  that  occur  in  "  Conversations  with  the  Old 
Dramatists,"  without  marking  the  greater  mellow 
ness  of  nature  from  which  the  later  criticism  pro 
ceeds.  Lowell  writes  of  them,  not  as  in  the  first 
instance  when  he  was  just  returned  from  a  voyage 
of  discovery,  but  as  one  who  has  lived  long  and 
familiarly  in  this  rich  country  of  the  poetic  mind.1 
Excepting  the  "  Biglow  Papers,"  a  couple  of  po 
litical  articles,  two  or  three  poems,  and  a  few  brief 
reviews  of  books,  Lowell  did  not  contribute  to  the 
Atlantic  during  the  four  years  of  the  war,  and\ 
naturally  he  turned  his  prose  work  into  the  North 
American  after  he  became  one  of  its  editors.  \ 
There,  as  we  have  seen,  his  work  was  mainly  po 
litical,  though  he  also  did  much  reviewing  of 
books;  but  after  the  pressure  of  war-time  was 
lifted  he  made  the  review  the  vehicle  for  more 
strictly  literary  articles,  and  it  was  plainly  a  relief 

1  An  interesting  venture  was  made  by  Little,  Brown  &  Co.  in 
the  summer  of  1864,  which  unfortunately  proved  too  uncertain  to 
be  carried  through.  Lowell  was  to  have  edited  a  series  of  vol 
umes  illustrative  of  the  Old  Dramatists,  from  Marlowe  down.  He 
prepared  one  volume,  which  was  put  into  type  but  never  pub 
lished.  A  set  of  proofs  is  in  the  library  of  Harvard  University. 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  79 

to  him  to  spring  back  to  subjects  more  congenial  to 
his  nature.  In  January,  1865,  when  Mr.  Norton 
supplied  the  main  political  paper,  Lowell  printed 
that  most  characteristic  article  which  in  his  col 
lected  writings  bears  the  title  "  New  England  Two 
Centuries  Ago,"  and  is  in  outward  form  a  review 
of  the  third  volume  of  Palfrey's  "  History  of  New 
England  "  and  of  four  volumes  of  the  collections 
of  the  Massachusetts  Historical  Society.  In  its 
larger  part  a  skilful  florilegium  of  early  writings, 
the  paper  is  also  and  emphatically  the  reflection  of 
Lowell's  mind  during  the  stress  of  the  war,  when 
he  was  doubly  concerned  over  the  relation  between 
the  two  great  English-speaking  nations  and  the 
practical  solutions  of  the  problems  presented  to 
democracy  in  the  reestablishment  of  order  and 
union  in  the  United  States.^  He  had  rising  in  him, 
as  his  Ode  shows,  a  great  passion  for  the  whole 
country ;  but  as  has  been  well  said  by  Colonel  Hig- 
ginson,  that  no  one  can  be  a  true  cosmopolitan  who\ 
is  not  at  home  in  his  own  country,  so  it  is  equally 
true  that  national  consciousness  has  its  basis  in\ 
localjride  and  affection.  The  genius  of  our  po- ' 
litical  organism,  by  which  one  is  called  on  for  a 
double  loyalty  to  state  and  nation,  a  loyalty  jeop 
arded  by  the  heresy  of  an  extreme  state-rights 
dogma,  was  finely  disclosed  in  Lowell's  attitude. 
Fortunately  for  us  the  locality,  the  community  in 
which  our  fortune  is  cast,  has  in  itself  a  political 
essence,  so  that  it  is  not  mere  attachment  to  the 
place  of  birth  and  breeding  which  makes  its  natu 
ral  demand  on  us,  but  membership  in  an  organism 


80  JAMES  RUSSELL   LOWELL 

lacking  only  the  crown  of  absolute  independence  to 
make  it  a  unit  of  politics.  It  is  a  subtle  but  very 
real  distinction  between  state  and  nation  that  per 
mits  not  a  divided  but  a  complex  loyalty,  and  the 
profound  meaning  which  lies  in  the  interplay  of 
state  and  federal  power  is  reflected  in  the  con 
sciousness  of  Americans  as  they  bear  themselves 
toward  one  or  the  other  authority. 

Now  New  England,  though  not  an  entity  in  poli 
tics,  has  so  distinct  a  character  that  each  of  the 
states  included  in  that  name  is  representative  of  an 
order  which  is  far  more  than  a  geographical  divi 
sion.  Largely  by  reason  of  its  historic  genesis  and 
development,  New  England  is  more  an  individual 
than  any  other  group  of  commonwealths  unless  it 
be  the  Cotton  States,  and  a  man  of  Massachusetts, 
clearly  the  heart  of  the  whole  system,  is  very  sure 
to  think  of  himself  as  a  New  Englander  without 
prejudice  to  his  loyalty  to  his  own  state.  Lowell 
certainly  did.  It  was  through  New  England,  its 
history,  its  spirit,  its  genius,  that  he  apprehended 
the  very  nature  of  freedom  and  the  principles  of 
democracy.  Mr.  Henry  James  has  well  said : 
"  New  England  was  heroic  to  him,  for  he  felt  in 
his  pulses  the  whole  history  of  her  origines  ;  it  was 
impossible  to  know  him  without  a  sense  that  he 
had  a  rare  divination  of  the  hard  realities  of  her 
past." l  And  this  article  on  "  New  England  Two 
Centuries  Ago,"  designed  to  offer  something  of  a 
conspectus  of  a  people  and  land  from  which  he  was 

1  "  James  Russell  Lowell,"  in  the  Atlantic  Monthly,  January, 
1892. 


POETRY   AND   PROSE  81 

sprung,  whose  life  was  coursing  in  his  veins,  was 
also  an  interpretation  of  the  political  faith  he  held, 
a  faith  which  he  postulated  for  the  final  manifes 
tation  of  the  whole  nation  that  in  his  imagination 
he  saw  rising  out  of  the  confusion  of  struggle.  "  I 
have  little  sympathy,"  he  says  at  the  close,  "  with 
declaimers  about  the  Pilgrim  Fathers,  who  look 
upon  them  all  as  men  of  grand  conceptions  and  su 
perhuman  foresight.  An  entire  ship's  company  of 
Columbuses  is  what  the  world  never  saw.  It  is  not 
wise  to  form  any  theory  and  fit  our  facts  to  it,  as  a 
man  in  a  hurry  is  apt  to  cram  his  travelling-bag, 
with  a  total  disregard  of  shape  or  texture.  But 
perhaps  it  may  be  found  that  the  facts  will  only  fit 
comfortably  together  on  a  single  plan,  namely,  that 
the  fathers  did  have  a  conception  (which  those  will 
call  grand  who  regard  simplicity  as  a  necessary 
element  of  grandeur)  of  founding  here  a  common 
wealth  j>n_Jhqse  two  eternal  bases  of  Faith__and 
Work ;  that  they  had  indeed  no  revolutionary 
ideas  of  universal  liberty,  but  yet,  what  answered 
the  purpose  quite  as  well,  an  abiding  faith  in  the 
brotherhood  of  man  and  the  fatherhood  of  God  ; 
and  that  they  did  not  so  much  propose  to  make  all 
things  new,  as  to  develop  the  latent  possibilities 
of  English  law  and  English  character,  by  clearing 
away  the  fences  by  which  the  abuse  of  the  one  was 
gradually  discommoning  the  other  from  the  broad 
fields  of  universal  right.  They  were  not  in  ad 
vance  of  their  age,  as  it  is  called,  for  no  one  who 
is  so  can  ever  work  profitably  in  it ;  but  they  were 
alive  to  the  highest  and  most  earnest  thinking  of 
their  time." 


82  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

In  this  article,  also,  one  may  see  something  of 
Lowell's  feeling  about  England,  which  again  was 
almost  a  traditionary  sentiment.  He  saw  the 
mother  country  through  the  glass  of  New  England, 
and  especially  valued  that  Puritan  strain  in  Eng 
lish  history  which  had  found  such  free  play  in  New 
England.  "  Puritanism,"  he  says,  "  believing  it 
self  quick  with  the  seed  of  religious  liberty,  laid, 
without  knowing  it,  the  egg  of  democracy ; "  and 
he  found  in  the  governmental  attitude  of  England 
toward  America  in  his  own  day  a  reminder  of  the 
policy  exercised  after  the  Kestoration  toward  New 
England. 

Lowell's  letters  make  it  clear  that  at  this  time 
he  was  not  given  to  the  enjoyment  of  much  hospi 
tality.  Mrs.  Lowell  was  frequently  an  invalid, 
and  though  he  had  familiar  friends  to  stay  with 
him,  as  Kowse  the  painter,  and  gave  cordial  invi 
tations  to  such  as  might  be  passing  through  Cam 
bridge,  he  neither  entertained  much  himself  nor 
accepted  entertainment  at  other  houses.  Now  and 
then  some  man  of  letters  came  over  from  England 
or  France  and  Lowell  was  asked  to  meet  him.  He 
records  such  an  experience  in  a  letter  dated  20 
September,  1861 :  - 

"  1  dined  the  other  day  with  Anthony  Trollope, 
a  big,  red-faced,  rather  underbred  Englishman  of 
the  bald-with-spectacles  type.  A  good  roaring  posi 
tive  fellow  who  deafened  me  (sitting  on  his  right) 
till  I  thought  of  Dante's  Cerberus.  He  says  he 
goes  to  work  on  a  novel  '  just  like  a  shoemaker  on 
a  shoe,  only  taking  care  to  make  honest  stitches.' 


POETRY   AND   *  .IOSE  83 

Gets  up  at  5  every  day,  does  all  his  writing  before 
breakfast,  and  always  writes  just  so  many  pages  a 
day.  He  and  Dr.  Holmes  were  very  entertaining. 
The  Autocrat  started  one  or  two  hobbies,  and 
charged,  paradox  in  rest  —  but  it  was  pelting  a 
rhinoceros  with  seed-pearl. 

"  Dr.  You  don't  know  what  Madeira  is  in  Eng 
land  ? 

"  T.    I  'm  not  so  sure  it 's  worth  knowing. 

"  Dr.  Connoisseurship  in  it  with  us  is  a  fine  art. 
There  are  men  who  will  tell  you  a  dozen  kinds,  as 
Dr.  Waagen  would  know  a  Carlo  Dolci  from  a 
Guido. 

"  T.    They  might  be  better  employed  ! 

"  Dr.  Whatever  is  worth  doing  is  worth  doing 
well. 

"  T.  Ay,  but  that 's  begging  the  whole  question. 
I  don't  admit  it 's  worse  doing  at  all.  If  they  earn 
their  bread  by  it,  it  may  be  worse  doing  (roaring). 

"  Dr.    But  you  may  be  assured  — 

"  T.  No,  but  I  may  n't  be  asshorred.  I  worit  be 
asshored.  I  don't  intend  to  be  asshored  (roaring 
louder)  ! 

"  And  so  they  went  it.  It  was  very  funny.  Trol- 
lope  would  n't  give  him  any  chance.  Meanwhile, 
Emerson  and  I,  who  sat  between  them,  crouched 
down  out  of  range  and  had  some  very  good  talk, 
with  the  shot  hurtling  overhead.  I  had  one  little 
passage  at  arms  with  T.  apropos  of  English 
peaches.  T.  ended  by  roaring  that  England  was 
the  only  country  where  such  a  thing  as  a  peach 
or  a  grape  was  known.  I  appealed  to  Haw- 


84  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

thorne,  who  sat  opposite.  His  face  mantled  and 
trembled  for  a  moment  with  some  droll  fancy,  as 
one  sees  bubbles  rise  and  send  off  rins:s  in  still 

o 

water  when  a  turtle  stirs  at  the  bottom,  and  then 
he  said,  c  I  asked  an  Englishman  once  who  was 
praising  their  peaches  to  describe  to  me  exactly 
what  he  meant  by  a  peach,  and  he  described  some 
thing  very  like  a  cucumber.'  I  rather  liked  Trol- 
lope." 

Lowell  found  in  the  winter  of  1865-1866  a  most 
congenial  occasion  for  society  in  the  meetings  in 
Mr.  Longfellow's  study,  held  for  scrutiny  of  the 
proofs  of  that  poet's  translation  of  the  "  Divina 
Commedia."  Mr.  Longfellow  records  in  his  Diary, 
25  October,  1865  :  "Lowell,  Norton,  and  myself 
had  the  first  meeting  of  our  Dante  Club.  We 
read  the  XXV.  Puryatorio  ;  and  then  had  a  little 
supper.  We  are  to  meet  every  Wednesday  even 
ing  at  my  house."  In  the  first  Report  of  the 
Dante  Society,  Mr.  Norton  gives  a  full  and  inter 
esting  account  of  these  meetings,  and  of  the  task 
they  set  themselves. 

"  We  paused,"  he  says,  "  over  every  doubtful 
passage,  discussed  the  various  readings,  considered 
the  true  meaning  of  obscure  words  and  phrases, 
sought  for  the  most  exact  equivalent  of  Dante's 
expression,  objected,  criticised,  praised,  with  a 
freedom  that  was  made  perfect  by  Mr.  Longfel 
low's  absolute  sweetness,  simplicity,  and  modesty, 
and  by  the  entire  confidence  that  existed  between 
us.  Witte's  text  was  always  before  us,  and  of  the 
early  commentators  Buti  was  the  one  to  whom  we 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  85 

had  most  frequent  and  most  serviceable  recourse. 
They  were  delightful  evenings ;  there  could  be  no 
pleasanter  occupation ;  the  spirits  of  poetry,  of 
learning,  of  friendship,  were  with  us.  Now  and 
then  some  other  friend  or  acquaintance  would  join 
us  for  the  hours  of  study.  Almost  always  one  or 
two  guests  would  come  in  at  ten  o'clock,  when  the 
work  ended,  and  sit  down  with  us  to  a  supper,  with 
which  the  evening  closed." 

With  the  North  American  Review  still  making 
its  quarterly  demands  upon  him,  but  the  political 
impulse  less  urgent,  Lowell  turned  naturally  to  lit 
erary  criticism.  Thus  far,  he  had  not  made  any 
deliberate  appraisal  of  great  writers,  save  in  his 
short  paper  on  Keats,  which,  from  the  occasion 
that  called  it  out,  was  rather  biographical  than 
critical.  He  had  in  a  fragmentary  fashion  in  his  f 
" Conversations,"  and  in  a  discursive  manner  in  his- 
lectures,  given  appreciations  of  the  great  poets  and 
dramatists  of  England,  but  in  the  next  decade  he 
was  to  print  a  series  of  essays  which  should  em 
body  his  reading,  study,  reflection,  and  poetic  in 
sight  in  that  field  of  human  endeavor  where  his 
own  work  stands,  and  which  had  been  since  his 
boyish  days  the  one  great  subject  of  his  investiga 
tion. 

History,  which  he  read  with  avidity,  was  the 
background  from  which  were  projected  the  great 
figures  of  literature.  Philosophy  was  not  for  him 
a  system  of  independent  reasoning,  but  rather  the 
unclassified  winged  thoughts  on  high  themes  em 
bodied  in  great  poetic  and  dramatic  art.  Lan- 


86  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

guage,  always  a  subject  full  of  interest  for  him, 
was  attacked,  not  from  the  point  of  view  of  a  man 
of  science,  but  from  that  of  one  curious  of  its 
human  relations  and  its  instrumentality  in  art. 
Nor  was  his  knowledge  of  the  plastic  arts  more 
than  that  which  comes  incidentally  to  a  traveller 
and  a  general  reader  and  observer,  or  his  interest 
in  them  especially  keen.  He  was  very  likely  to 
bring  the  canons  of  literary  art  to  bear  upon  them, 
sometimes  indeed,  as  might  be  guessed,  with 
shrewdness  and  analogical  truthfulness  ;  or  he  was 
affected  by  personal  considerations,  as  when  he 
writes  of  Story :  "  I  saw  the  photographs  of  Wil 
liam's  statues,  and  think  them  very  fine.  They 
are  really  noble.  The  Quincy  is  admirable  —  the 
best  thing  of  the  kind  our  modern  times  has  pro 
duced.  In  short,  to  my  thinking,  William  is  the 
only  man  of  them  all  who  knows  how  to  do  the 
thing.  It  was  a  real  pleasure  to  be  so  thoroughly 
satisfied  with  the  work  of  an  old  friend."  He  re 
cognized  frankly  his  own  limitations  in  the  matter, 
as  indeed  he  was  disposed  to  think  the  defect  al 
most  ineradicable  in  the  Saxon,  who  "  has  never 
shown  any  capacity  for  art,  nay,  commonly  commits 
ugly  blunders  when  he  is  tempted  in  that  direc 
tion  ;  "  and  apparently  his  only  suggestion  for  bet 
tering  the  condition  was  to  put  before  workmen 
good  illustrations  of  great  art  in  the  books  they 
should  find  in  their  libraries,  and  give  them  an 
acquaintance  with  Ruskin's  writings. 

But  literature  stood  to  him  as  the  great  expo 
nent  of  all  that  was  permanent  in  the  human  spirit. 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  sj 

"  There  is  much,"  he  says,  "  that  is  deciduous  in 
books,  but  all  that  gives  them  a  title  to  rank  as 
literature  in  the  highest  sense  is  perennial.  Their 
vitality  is  the  vitality  not  of  one  or  another  blood 
or  tongue,  but  of  human  nature ;  their  truth  is  not 
topical  and  transitory,  but  of  universal  acceptation ; 
and  thus  all  great  authors  seem  the  coevals  not 
only  of  each  other,  but  of  whoever  reads  them, 
growing  wiser  with  him  as  he  grows  wise,  and  un 
locking  to  him  one  secret  after  another  as  his  own 
life  and  experience  give  him  the  key,  but  on  no 
other  condition."  l  f  It  was  with  this  principle  de-! 
termining  his  choice  that  he  proceeded  with  morej 
or  less  conscious  assembling  to  discourse  on  Car- 
lyle,  Emerson,  Lessing,  Rousseau,  Shakespeare, 
Dryden,  Chaucer,  Pope,  Milton,  Dante,  Spenser, 
and  Wordsworth,  as  well  as  to  write  in  many  de 
tached  passages  on  the  genius  of  Goethe.  Later 
he  returned  to  the  same  general  field,  and  besides 
revising  his  judgment  on  some  of  these  topics, 
treated  also  with  more  or  less  fulness  of  Gray, 
Cervantes,  Fielding,  and  Coleridge,  while  any  one 
who  consults  the  elaborate  index  to  his  prose  writ 
ings  will  readily  see  how  many  other  authors  who 
belong  in  the  great  ranks  have  been  drawn  upon 
for  illustration  of  the  one  great  theme.  | 

To  his  reading  of  all  this  literature  he  brought 
the  touchstone  of  his  own  lifejmd  experience.  In 
this  word  "experience,"  moreover,  must  be  included 
his  own  highest  experiments.  His  poetry,  for  the 
most  part,  as  we  have  already  seen,  does  not  have 

1  "Shakespeare  Once  More,"  iii.  33. 


88  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

its  roots  in  other  literature ;  it  springs  from  that 
life  which  he  held  in  common  with  those  whom  he 
reverenced  for  their  own  acts  of  literary  creation. 
He  quotes  the  recommendation  of  a  friend  that  he 
should  read  poetry,  feed  himself  on  bee  bread  so 
that  he  might  get  into  the  mood  of  writing  poetry ; 
'but,  though  all  his  life  long  Lowell  fed,  as  by  the 
most  natural  appetite,  on  poetry  and  other  forms 
of  imaginative  literature,  his  own  poetry  is  not 
bookish,  nor  does  it  borrow  in  form  or  phrase. 
Even  when  most  impressionable  in  his  youth,  the 
influence  upon  him  of  Keats  and  Tennyson  was 
more  obvious  than  that  of  Shakespeare  or  Mar 
lowe,  only  because,  eschewing  the  imitative,  his 
verse  took  the  color  of  his  generation.  The  like 
nesses  were  always  general,  and  when  he  essayed 
forms  of  verse  most  rigid  in  their  historical  de 
velopment,  as  the  sonnet  and  the  ode,  he  simply 
obeyed  the  law  as  his  great  progenitors  had  done, 
finding  his  freedom  within  the  law,  and  not  in  out 
breaks  and  protests.  The  conscious  intention  to 
be  original,  he  himself  says,  seldom  leads  to  any 
thing  better  than  extravagance ;  and  there  is  a 
passage  in  his  paper  on  Chaucer  which  sums  up 
a  large  part  of  his  literary  philosophy.1 

"  Poets  have  forgotten  that  the  first  lesson  of 
literature,  no  less  than  of  life,  is  the  learning  how 
to  burn  your  own  smoke ;  that  the  way  to  be  ori 
ginal  is  to  be  healthy  ;  that  the  fresh  color,  so  de 
lightful  in  all  good  writing,  is  won  by  escaping 
from  the  fixed  air  of  self  into  the  brisk  atmosphere 

1  "  Chaucer,"  iii.  292. 


POETRY  AND  PROSE  89 

of  universal  sentiments ;  and  that  to  make  the  com 
mon  marvellous,  as  iiLit  were_a  revelation,  is  the 
test  of  genius." 

With  his  large  literary  essays  as  works  of  art  I 
do  not  purpose  concerning  myself  ;  such  study  lies 
somewhat  outside  the  range  of  a  biography,  but  as 
these  papers  formed  a  considerable  and  very  im-i 
portant-expression  of  his  mind  at  one  period  of  his  \ 
life,  it  is  worth  while  to  look  at  them  with  a  view 
to  discover  how  far  they  serve  to  disclose  him,  to 
read  them  by  the  light  of  his  experience,  and  to  see 
if  he  put  his  personality  into  this  form  of  writing. 
The  publication  of  Carlyle's  "Frederick  the  Great" 
was  the  occasion  of  the  first  of  these  articles.  In 
writing  of  it  to  Leslie  Stephen,  when  it  was  re 
printed  in  "  My  Study  Windows,"  he  admits  that) 
he  was  harder  on  Carlyle  than  he  meant  to  be, 
because  he  was  fighting  against  a  secret  partialityJ 
The  phrase  lets  one  a  little  into  Lowell's  mind. 
As  far  back  as  in  his  college  days  he  was  reading 
Carlyle  with  gusto,  and  the  breezy  description1 
which  he  gave  of  Boston  at  the  period  when  Car 
lyle's  "  message  "  acted  as  a  sort  of  leaven  in  the 
new  dough  of  New  England,  was  a  lively  reminis 
cence  of  his  own  tumultuous  youth.  Thus,  upon 
writing  of  Carlyle  when  he  himself  was  nearing 
the  line  of  fifty,  there  was  an  undercurrent  of  remi- ' 
niscence  of  his  own  callowness.  He  remembered 
his  devotion  to  the  Carlyle  of  the  "  Miscellanies," 
and  was  more  or  less  conscious  that  he  had  out 
lived  his  first  enthusiasm.  With  all  his  admira- 

1  "Thoreau,"i.  361. 


90  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

tion  for  the  great  critic  who  stirred  him  when  he 
was  himself  pricking  on  the  plain  of  Reform,  his 
point  of  view  was  now  changed,  for  he  had  left  Car- 
lyle's  side  and  come  into  more  complete  possession 
of  his  own  judgment.  [  The  secret  influences  which 
forbade  him  to  be  preponderatingly  ethical,  which 
kept  him  from  abandoning  himself  to  the  anti- 
slavery  cause,  even  when  he  was  fighting  in  the 
ranks,  and  made  it  impossible  for  him  to  be  a  great 
teacher,  though  quite  aware  of  what  constitutes  a 
great  teacher,  had  lessened,  perhaps,  his  effective 
ness  in  some  single  direction,  but  had  given  him 
greater  poise  arid  enabled  him  on  rare  occasions 
to  bring  all  his  powers  into  play,  and  then  to  do 
easily,  without  conscious  effort,  the  thing  he  wanted 
to  do.  The  "  Commemoration  Ode  "  is  an  instance, 
and  in  this  judgment  of  Carlyle  he  seems  to  me 
unwittingly  to  be  judging  the  Lowell  who  seemed 
somewhat  possible  in  the  days  when  he  first  read 
Carlyle.  There  is  a  sentence  in  the  essay  which 
puts  the  thing  in  a  nutshell.  "  The  delicate  skele 
ton  of  admirably  articulated  and  related  parts 
which  underlies  and  sustains  every  true  work  of 
art,  and  keeps  it  from  sinking  on  itself  a  shapeless 
heap,  he  [Carlyle]  would  crush  remorselessly  to 
come  at  the  marrow  of  meaning.  With  him  the 
ideal  sense  is  secondary  to  the  ethical  and  meta 
physical,  and  he  has  but  a  faint  conception  of  their 
possible  unity." 

i.      It  was  in  the  growing  conception  of  this  unity 
\_i  that  Lowell  had  moved  away  from  Carlyle.     The 
constant  adjustment  of  the  ide&L&nd  the  ethical  I 


POETRY  AND  PROSE  91 

had  been  the  ripening  process  in  his  mind,  a  pro 
cess  greatly  stimulated  by  the  urgent  need  he  felt 
during  the  past  few  years  for  finding  some  com 
mon  ground  on  which  his  visions  of  truth  and  free 
dom  and  his  practical  sense  could  meet.  It  was 
largely  through  a  great  political  realization  that 
Lowell  came  to  be  what  thenceforth  he  was,  a  sane 
critic  of  literature  and  a  poet  whose  imagination 
instinctively  sought  large  moulds.  This  is  not  to 
say  that  he  was  indifferent  to  any  other  expression ; 
his  nature  was  too  free  and  spontaneous  for  that ; 
but  if  one  is  to  be  measured  by  the  main  incidents 
of  his  life,  it  is  fair  to  say  that  the  Lowell  who 
after  this  left  his  impress  on  his  countrymen  was 
a  man  of  such  balance  of  mind  that  his  judgments 
and  his  poems  alike  had  the  weight  that  comes 
from  this  equipoise,  and  the  man  thus  character 
ized  could  scarcely  fail  in  new  relations  to  show  the 
ease  of  one  self-centred,  and  not  the  restlessness 
and  anxiety  of  an  experimenter  with  life. 

(_lt  is  this  consciousness  of  art  governed  by  great 
laws,  whether  applied  to  life  or  to  literature,  that 
dominates  Lowell's  expression^and  in  the  essay  on  \ 
Carlyle,  his  keenest  criticism  is  called  out  by  his 
perception  of  Carlyle's  failure  in  this  respect. 
"  Had  Mr.  Carlyle  been  fitted  out  completely  by 
nature  as  an  artist,  he  would  have  had  an  ideal  in 
his  work  which  would  have  lifted  his  mind  away 
from  the  muddier  part  of  him,  and  trained  him  to 
the  habit  of  seeking  and  seeing  the  harmony  rather 
than  the  discord  and  contradiction  of  things." 
Again  we  read  in  this  passage  the  unconscious  re- 


92  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

flection  of  its  writer's  own  mind,  which  once  had 
been  far  enough  away  from  this  habit.  Nothing 
in  Carlyle  appears  to  interest  him  more  than  the 
lawlessness  into  which  his  exuberant  humor  had 
led  him,  and  the  narrow  escape  he  had  had  of 
being  a  great  poet,  and  he  sums  up  his  judgment 
of  "  Frederick  the  Great "  by  saying  that  "  it  has 
the  one  prime  merit  of  being  the  work  of  a  man 
who  has  every  quality  of  a  great  poet  except  that 
supreme  one  of  rhythm,  which  shapes  both  matter 
and  manner  to  harmonious  proportion,  and  that 
where  it  is  good,  it  is  good  as  only  genius  knows 
how  to  be." 

In  the  same  number  of  the  Review  which  holds  \ 
this  article  on  Carlyle  appears  a  shorter  one  on  ' 
Swinburne,  which,  though  dealing  with  a  more 
occasional  subject,  also  illustrates  the  temper  in 
which  Lowell  was  now  writing,  and  has  a  special 
interest,  since  it  deals  directly  with  poetry  and  inti 
mates,  that  when  treating  of  a  contemporary  writer 
his  mind  was  most  set  on  that  aspect_of  poetry 
which  ignores  the  distinction  of  time.  The  phe 
nomenon  of  a  new  poet  sends  him  back  into  an 
inquiry  into  the  very  realities  of  poetry  itself. 
Though  he  has  a  few  specific  criticisms  of  Swin 
burne's  "  Chastelard  "  and  his  "  Atalanta  in  Caly- 
don,"  the  theme  which  interests  him  most  is  the 
possibility  of  reenacting jintiq uity  in  poetry,  and 
he  devotes  the  larger  part  of  his  paper  to  a  demon 
stration  of  the  truth  that  the  result  of  all  such 
endeavors  is  to  produce  the  artificial  and  not  the 
artistic.  In  a  letter  to  Mr.  Stedman,  written  ap- 


POETRY   AND   PROSE  93 

parently  when  this  subject  was  fresh  in  his  mind, 
he  repeats  his  conclusion  with  the  force  of  a 
friendly  letter  writer.  Mr.  Stedman  had  thanked 
him  for  a  review  of  his  poem,  "  Alice  of  Mon- 
mouth,"  but  asks  his  judgment  of  another  poem 
he  had  written  on  an  antique  theme.  "  I  will 
answer  frankly,"  wrote  Lowell,  "  that  I  did  not 
like  Alektryon,  and  don't  think  him  at  all  to  be 
compared  to  his  sister  Alice,  —  a  strutting  fellow 
that  wants  to  make  me  believe  he  can  crow  in 
ancient  Greek.  Alice  is  Christian,  modern,  Ameri 
can,  and  that 's  why  I  like  her.  I  don't  believe  in 
these  modern  antiques  —  no,  not  in  Landor,  not  in 
Swinburne,  not  in  any  of  'em.  They  are  all  wrong. 
It 's  like  writing  Latin  verses  —  the  material  you 
work  in  is  dead." 

Though  Lowell  had  thus  turned  with  avidity  to 
his  more  congenial  field  of  letters,  he  was  not  yet 
to  be  released  from  the  duty  imposed  upon  him 
by  his  editorship  of  the  Review,  and  by  his  own 
political  thought,  of  taking  part  in  the  discussion 
which  Reconstruction  raised.  In  the  same  number 
of  the  North  American  which  contained  the  two 
papers  just  noted,  he  wrote  also  an  article  on  "  The 
President  on  the  Stump,"  which,  after  a  cursory 
consideration  of  the  growing  division  between  Pre 
sident  Johnson  and  Congress,  closed  with  a  hypo 
thetical  address  delivered  to  a  Southern  delegation 
by  an  imaginary  President  Johnson.  Into  this 
address  Lowell  packed  his  convictions  as  to  the 
attitude  which  should  be  taken  toward  the  South 
ern  States  by  a  President  who  had  come  from  the 


94  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

South.  It  was  so  unusual  for  Lowell  to  dramatize, 
even  in  poetry,  that  this  assumption  has  a  singu 
lar  interest,  and,  barring  the  element  of  Southern 
birth,  is  a  close  copy  of  Lowell's  mind  at  this  time. 
Every  man  of  thought  has  his  dream  of  action, 
and  we  can  read  in  this  speech  how  Lowell  would 
have  translated  his  ideals  of  truth,  freedom,  and 
justice  into  executive  acts,  could  he,  who  had 
watched  the  conflict  closely,  have  had  the  chance 
that  poets  picture  of  being  king  for  a  day. 

Perhaps  all  this  was  in  his  mind  when  he  wrote 
in  his  last  "  Biglow  Paper :  "  — 

"  Ez  I  wuz  sayV,  I  hain't  no  chance  to  speak 
So 's  't  all  the  country  dreads  me  onct  a  week, 
But  I  've  consid'ble  o'  thet  sort  o'  head 
That  sets  to  home  an'  thinks  wut  might  be  said." 

This  last  paper,  "  Mr.  Hosea  Biglow's  Speech  in 
March  Meeting,"  followed  in  the  May  Atlantic, 
and  said  over  again  the  same  lesson  in  the  freer 
form  of  verse  and  with  the  more  familiar  dramatic 
impersonation  of  the  Yankee  countryman.  It  is 
an  illustration  of  the  greater  carrying  power  of 
Lowell's  verse  over  his  prose  that  the  shrewd  po 
litical  philosophy  which  lies  in  the  two  series  of  the 
"  Biglow  Papers,''  closely  as  it  applied  to  the  polit 
ical  situations  in  1846-1848  and  1861-1866,  has 
come  again  into  play  in  the  very  different  situation 
in  national  politics  following  the  war  for  the  inde 
pendence  of  Cuba,  so  that  while  one  would  find  in 
the  newspapers  but  few  quotations  from  Lowell's 
"  Political  Essays  "  he  would  find  plenty  of  lines 
from  the  "  Biglow  Papers." 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  95 

These  two  productions  were  not  to  be  the  last  of 
his  political  writings  at  this  period.  One  more 
was  to  follow  in  October,  but  the  impulse  to  take 
part  in  the  discussion  of  national  events  was  re 
laxed,  and  he  was  falling  back  into  his  more  con 
genial  life  of  devotion  to  letters  in  the  quiet  retreat 
of  Elmwood.  "  My  dear  Charles,"  he  writes  to 
Mr.  Norton,  30  May,  1866,  "  I  snatch  a  moment 
from  the  whirl  of  dissipation  to  bring  up  for  you 
the  annals  of  Cambridge  to  the  present  date.  In 
the  first  place,  Cranch  and  his  daughters  are  stay 
ing  with  us  —  since  last  Saturday.  On  that  day  I 
took  him  to  club,  where  he  saw  many  old  friends 
(he  has  not  been  here  for  twenty  years,  poor  fel 
low  !)  and  had  a  good  time.  We  had  a  pleasant 
time,  I  guess.  With  me  it  was  a  business  meeting. 
I  sat  between  Hoar  and  Brimmer,  that  I  might 
talk  over  college  matters.  Things  will  be  arranged 
to  suit  me,  I  rather  think,  and  the  salary  (perhaps) 
left  even  larger  than  I  hoped. 

"  Cranch  and  I  amuse  me  very  much.  They 
read  their  poems  to  each  other  like  a  couple  of 
boys,  and  so  contrive  for  themselves  a  very  good- 
natured,  if  limited,  public.  I  cannot  help  laughing 
to  myself,  whenever  I  am  alone,  at  these  rhythmi 
cal  debauches.  The  best  of  it  is  that  there  is  al 
ways  one  at  least  who  is  never  bored.  I  like  him 
very  much,  though  it  always  makes  me  a  little  sad 
that  a  man  with  so  many  gifts  should  lack  the  one 
of  being  successful.  He  brought  with  him  a  fairy 
story  full  of  fancy,  and  illustrations,  most  of  which 
are  as  charming  and  original  as  can  be.  I  hope  to 


96  JAMES   RUSSELL   LOWELL 

get  Fields  to  publish  it.1  Cranch  wants  some  such 
encouragement  very  much.  |  He  begins  to  think 
himself  born  under  an  ill  star.  I  fancy  the  trouble 
is  that  he  was  not  brought  up  to  work,  in  a  nation 
of  day  laborers!.  You  know  I  have  a  natural  sym 
pathy  with  the  butterflies  as  against  the  ants  and 
the  bees,  and  I  think  they  will  all  be  put  in  a 
heavenly  poor-house  one  of  these  days,  with  the 
industrious  rich  to  work  for  them,  and  buy  their 
books  and  pictures.  Cranch  always  reminds  me 
of  Clough,  so  you  may  be  sure  I  like  to  have  him 
here.  We  shall  enjoy  each  other  very  much  if  we 
don't  quarrel  over  our  poems. 

"  You  will  see  my  verses  to  Bartlett  in  the  next 
Atlantic?  and  I  guess  you  will  like  'em.  They 
seemed  to  me  fanciful  and  easy  when  I  corrected 
the  proof,  with  some  droll  triple  rhymes.  .  .  . 

"  It  is  now  high  time  to  change  the  conversation 
and  speak  of  the  weather.  We  are  having  it  of 
the  rarest  April  sort  —  whims  of  sunshine  dappling 
a  continuous  mood  of  rain  —  erratic  thunderclaps 
ending  like  my  novel  with  the  first  chapter  — 
promising  notes  of  fine  to-morrows  ending  not  in 
bankruptcy  but  liquidation.  In  short,  the  clerk  of 
the  weather  seems  suddenly  to  have  bethought  him 
of  his  remissness  with  the  watering-pot  for  the  last 
two  years  and  is  making  it  up  all  at  once.  All 
the  wells  (except,  of  course,  that  of  Truth)  will 
be  filled  again  and  milk  will  be  plenty  once  more. 

1  This  was  no  doubt  Cranch's  Kobboltozo. 

2  "To   J.   B.   on   sending  me  a  seven-pound  trout,"  Atlantic 
Monthly,  July,  1866. 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  97 

The  greenness  of  everything  is  delicious.  I  feel  as 
if  I  were  sprouting  myself,  so  keen  is  my  farmer's 
sympathy  with  my  beets  and  carrots,  and  especially 
with  a  new  field  of  grass  which  was  becoming  too 
emblematic  of  flesh,  and  has  been  snatched  from 
the  very  jaws  of  death  by  this  intervention  of  Jupi 
ter  Pluvius.  I  had  just  had  a  new  pump  set  in  the 
well  at  the  foot  of  the  garden,  and  had  begun  to 
think  it  would  be  merely  a  dry  symbol,  but  this 
will  set  all  its  arteries  a-throbbing. 

"Your  dream  of  a  stock-farm  is  a  delightful 
one  (there  is  a  yellow-bird  in  the  cherry-tree  by 
my  window  drinking  the  tremulous  rain  diamonds 
that  hang  under  the  twigs),  but  I  fear  that  the 
only  stocks  I  am  young  enough  for  now  are  in  rail 
road  companies  and  the  like  —  whose  golden  fleeces 
yield  a  half  yearly  clip.  I  am  satisfied,  though, 
that  nobody  has  such  a  sympathy  with  the  seasons 
and  feels  himself  so  truly  a  partner  in  the  trade  of 
nature  as  a  farmer.  I  find  great  pleasure  in  my 
own  little  ventures  in  this  Earth-ship  of  ours  on 
her  annual  voyages,  and  shall  even  grow  jolly  again 
if  my  college  duties  are  so  arranged  next  year  that 
I  shall  get  rid  of  some  of  my  worries,  and  be  able 
to  give  my  trees  and  crops  the  encouragement  of 
a  cheerful  face.  Depend  upon  it,  they  feel  it  and 
grow  in  proportion.  Fancy  the  disheartenment  of 
a  regiment  of  cabbages  or  turnips  when  they  see 
the  commander-in-chief  with  a  long  face !  Where 
shall  they  find  the  cheerful  juices  that  shall  carry 
them  through  a  long  drouth,  or  the  happy  temper 
that  is  as  good  as  an  umbrella  to  'em  in  dull  wet 


98  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

spells  of  weather,  if  their  natural  leader  be  as 
bloodless  as  the  one,  or  show  no  better  head  than 
the  other  ?  Does  n't  it  stand  to  reason  ?  " 

Six  weeks  later  he  wrote  to  the  same  friend : 
"  The  hot  weather  we  have  been  having  for  some 
time  —  95°  for  nearly  a  week  together  —  has  pretty 
nearly  used  me  up.  It  has  made  me  bilious  and 
blue,  my  moral  thermometer  sinking  as  the  atmos 
pheric  rose.  But  Sunday  afternoon  we  had  one 
of  the  finest  thunderstorms  I  ever  saw,  beginning 
in  the  true  way  with  a  sudden  whirl  of  wind  that 
filled  the  air  with  leaves  and  dust  and  twigs  (di- 
nanzi  va  superbo),  followed  in  due  time  by  a  burst 
of  rain.  One  flash  struck  close  by  us  somewhere, 
and  I  heard  distinctly  the  crack  of  a  bough  at  the 
moment  of  its  most  intense  redness.  Just  at  sunset 
the  cloud  lifted  in  the  west,  and  the  effect  was  one 
that  I  always  wish  all  my  friends  could  be  at  Elm- 
wood  to  see.  The  tops  of  the  English  elms  were 
turned  to  sudden  gold,  which  seen  against  a  leaden 
background  of  thundercloud  had  a  supernatural 
look.  Presently  that  faded,  and  after  the  sun  had 
set  came  a  rainbow  more  extravagant  than  any  I 
ever  saw.  There  were  seven  lines  of  the  glory 
looking  like  the  breaking  of  quiet  surf  on  the 
beach  of  a  bay.  First  came  one  perfect  bow  —  the 
more  brilliant  that  the  landscape  was  dark  every 
where  by  the  absence  of  the  sunlight.  Gradually 
another  outlined  itself  at  some  distance  above,  and 
then  the  first  grew  double,  triple,  till  at  last  six 
arches  of  red  could  be  counted.  The  other  colors  I 
could  only  see  in  the  two  main  bows.  I  thought  it 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  99 

a  trick  of  vision,  but  Fanny  and  her  sister  counted 
as  I  did.  A  triple  arch  was  the  most  I  had  ever 
seen  before.  Here  is  a  diagram.  ...  c?  is  the 
spectator  for  whom  this  wonderful  show  was  exhib 
ited.  I  should  have  made  d  a  capital,  thus,  Z),  to 
indicate  his  importance  in  the  scene.  For  have  I 
not  read  in  some  old  moralist  that  God  would  not 
have  created  so  much  beauty  without  also  creating 
an  eye  to  see  and  a  soul  to  feel  it?  As  if  God 
could  not  be  a  poet !  The  author  of  the  book  of 
Genesis  knew  better.  However,  it  is  something  to 
have  had  an  eye  see  what  we  are  seeing ;  it  seems 
to  double  the  effect  by  some  occult  sympathy,  and 
my  rainbows  are  always  composed  of  one  part  rain, 
one  part  sunshine,  and  one  part  blessed  Henry 
Vaughan  with  his  '  Still  young  and  fine,'  and  his 
4  World's  gray  fathers  in  one  knot !  '  The  older  I 
grow  the  more  I  am  convinced  that  (there)  are  no 
satisfactions  so  deep  and  so  permanent  as  our  sym 
pathies  with  outward  nature.  .  .  . 

"  In  some  moods  I  heartily  despise  and  hate  my 
self,  there  is  so  much  woman  in  me  (.  .  .  I  mean 
no  harm.  I  was  designed,  sketched  rather,  for  a 
man).  Why,  I  found  myself  the  other  day  stand 
ing  in  a  muse  with  something  like  tears  in  my 
eyes,  before  a  little  pirus  that  had  rooted  itself 
on  the  steep  edge  of  the  runnel  that  drains  the 
meadow  above  Craigie's  pond,  and  thinking  — 
what  do  you  suppose  ?  Why,  how  happy  and  care 
less  the  life  of  such  a  poor  shrub  was  compared 
with  ours  !  But  I  was  in  a  melancholy  and  de 
sponding  mist  of  mind,  and  I  snatched  myself  back 


100  JAMES   RUSSELL   LOWELL 

out^  of  it  to  maiilieiLthoughts.  But  the  reality  and 
sincerity  of  the  emotion  struck  me  as  I  mused  over 
it,  and  I  set  it  down  on  the  debtor  side  of  my  ac 
count.  Still,  can  one  get  away  from  his  nature? 
That  always  puzzles  me.  Your  close-grained,  strong 
fellows  tell  you  that  you  can,  but  they  forget  that 
they  are  only  acting  out  their  complexion,  not  es 
caping  it.  I  did  not  expect  to  chase  my  rainbow 
into  such  a  miserable  drizzle,  but  for  that  very  rea 
son  I  will  let  it  go  as  I  have  written  it,  though  I  am 
rather  ashamed  of  having  uncovered  my  nakedness 
so  plumply.  In  spite  of  the  heat  we  have  had  rain 
enough  to  keep  the  country  beautiful,  and  my  salt 
marshes  have  been  in  their  glory.  The  salt  grass 
is  to  other  grass  like  fur  compared  with  hair,  and 
the  color  of  the  '  black  grass,'  and  even  its  texture 
at  the  right  distance  remind  one  of  sable.  I  have 
been  making  night  studies  of  late,  having  enjoyed, 
as  folks  say,  a  season  of  sleeplessness,  and  I  saw 
the  dawn  begin  the  other  night  at  two  o'clock. 
The  first  bird  to  sing  was  a  sparrow.  The  cocks 
followed  close  upon  him,  and  the  phoebe  upon  them. 
The  crows  were  the  latest  to  shake  the  night  out  of 
them. 

"  The  Corporation  have  given  me  a  tutor  and 
cut  my  salary  down  to  11500.  But  I  think  they 
will  give  me  what  they  call  a  '  gratuity  '  if  the  col 
lege  funds  justify  it.  If  not,  I  must  take  to  lec 
turing.  ...  I  am  called  away  to  the  hayfield,  so 
good-by.  I  work  more  or  less  every  day  out  of 
doors  and  like  it.  I  am  getting  back  as  well  as  I 
can  to  my  pristine  ways  of  life." 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  101 

He  had  wished  to  purchase  a  little  immunity 
from  the  routine  of  college  duties,  but  he  needed 
to  increase  his  income,  for  the  change  in  his  col 
lege  work,  though  it  gave  him  more  liberty,  left 
him  with  smaller  salary.  Except  for  the  months 
when  his  editorship  of  the  Atlantic  and  his  college 
professorship  had  jointly  given  him  a  fairly  com 
fortable  livelihood,  he  had  always  been  in  an  im 
pecunious  condition  ;  his  writings  had  not  been 
especially  remunerative,  and  as  he  was  somewhat 
dependent  on  outside  pressure  for  a  stimulus  to 
work,  it  is  probable  that  his  need  of  money  had 
furnished  this  stimulus. 

So  this  summer  he  was  not  unwilling  to  help 
himself  out  with  some  special  tasks  on  the  British 
Poets.  "  My  job,  "  he  writes, "  is  correcting  Dry- 
den  for  the  next  edition.  I  enjoy  it,  to  be  sure, 
but  it  is  rather  wearisome.  I  have  always  had  a 
great  respect  for  Dryden's  solid  ability,  and  I  am 
glad  to  read  him  in  this  minute  way  as  a  study  of 
his  language.  I  have  long  thought  that  he  was 
the  last  writer  of  really  first-rate  English  prose. 
Make  every  possible  deduction,  and  I  still  think 
so,  and  I  believe  it  is  because  of  two  things :  first, 
that  the  language  had  not  yet  been  sophisticated 
by  writing  for  the  press  ;  and  second,  that  he  wrote 
as  a  gentleman  rather  than  as  an  author.  It  is 
easy  to  see  why  his  verse  has  been  so  much  ad 
mired,  it  is  so  vigorous  and  easy,  and  there  is  such 
mastery  of  language.  Dry  den  knew  a  great  deal, 
and  uses  his  knowledge  with  an  ease  of  manner 
that  is  very  charming  to  me. 


102  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

"  The  work  takes  about  three  days  to  a  volume, 
and  I  have  the  first  two  to  go  over  again,  because 
I  corrected  more  than  they  are  willing  to  pay  for 
(I  mean  to  the  printer).  I  find  some  strange  non 
sense,  chiefly  caused  by  punctuation.  The  Donne, 
on  which  I  spent  three  or  four  weeks  of  unremit 
ting  work,  I  have  literally  lost.  Little  &  Brown 
don't  want  the  expense  of  printing,  and  I  have  lost 
the  book ;  can't  find  it  anywhere.  I  find  another 
copy  —  but  perfectly  clean  !  "  1 

A  proposal  was  made  at  this  time  that  he  should 
write  the  life  of  Hawthorne.  Longfellow  sug 
gested  this  to  Mrs.  Hawthorne,  who  talked  with 
Lowell  about  it.  He  was  attracted  by  the  subject, 
and  saw  that  he  would  have  abundant  material,  for 
Mrs.  Hawthorne  told  him  that  there  were  seven 
teen  volumes  of  notes,  beside  the  letters  which 
could  be  collected.  After  consideration,  however, 
Mrs.  Hawthorne  feared  to  take  the  risks  involved 
in  having  the  precious  manuscripts  go  out  of  her 
hands,  and  the  plan  was  abandoned,  Mrs.  Haw 
thorne  contenting  herself  with  printing  a  portion 
of  the  notes  in  the  Atlantic,  and  afterward  issuing 
the  several  volumes  of  Passages  from  the  Ameri 
can,  English,  French,  and  Italian  Note-Books. 

Lowell  was  busy  also  this  summer  getting  ready 
for  publication  the  second  series  of  the  "  Biglow 
Papers,"  his  chief  labor  being  in  the  long  Intro 
duction,  which  is  a  justification  of  his  use  of  the 

1  The  lost  copy  of  Donne  turned  up,  and  after  Lowell's  death 
his  daughter  and  Mr.  Norton  used  it  for  the  production  of  a 
special  edition  by  the  Grolier  Club  in  1895. 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  103 

rustic  New  England  form  by  a  careful  tracing  of 
many  of  the  words  and  plirases  and  local  pronun 
ciation  to  the  English  usage  of  the  seventeenth 
century,  brought  over  by  the  early  settlers  and 
domesticated  under  conditions  which  served  to  pre 
serve  them  in  common  speech.  And  here  may  be 
printed  an  unfinished  letter,  written  a  few  months 
later,  in  which  he  sets  forth  more  familiarly  some 
of  his  linguistic  views :  "  I  am  not  obstinate,  but 
Shakespeare  does  not  tack  his  '  lesses '  to  nouns 
but  to  verbs.  He  says  '  viewless  winds  '  in  '  Mea 
sure  for  Measure,'  and  means  as  Milton  does  in 
'  Comus  '  ('  I  must  be  viewless  now  ')  '  invisible/ 
So  in  '  Hamlet,'  when  he  says  '  woundless  air '  he 
means  'invulnerable,'  as  you  will  see  by  turning 
to  Act  I.,  scene  i.  I  admit  that  less  ought  to  be 
joined  to  a  noun  (as  in  German  los  always  is),  but 
I  think  one  may  sin  with  Shakespeare  or  Milton, 
for  my  instance  from  which  latter  I  have  to  thank 
Malone.  I  grant  that  Whittier  is  no  authority  — 
though  I  suspect  he  is  right  in  rhyming  for  the 
ear  and  not  for  the  eye,  as  used  to  be  the  fashion. 
So  long  as  we  don't  pronounce  arrums  Hibernice, 
why  should  n't  he  rhyme  it  with  psalms  ?  Not  that 
I  would.  I  would  be  conservative  about  pronun 
ciation,  —  the  test  of  good-breeding,  —  and  would 
leave  idioms  to  the  grace  of  God,  where  they  pro 
perly  belong.  Boys  and  blackguards  have  always 
been  my  masters  in  language.  I  have  always  felt 
that  if  I  could  attain  to  their  unconscious  freedom, 
I  were  safe.  I  would  not  insist  (for  example)  with 
our  excellent  Daily  Advertiser  on  '  house  to  be 


104  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

let,'  because  it  is  unidiomatic  and  because  it  is 
glossologically  wrong.  We  took  it  directly  from 
the  French  maison  a  louer.  Nor  would  I  say  '  by 
auction,'  because  '  at '  is  quite  as  good.  Nor  would 
I  say  '  the  house  is  in  process  of  erection '  for  '  the 
house  is  building.' ': 

Lowell  dedicated  his  second  series  of  "  Biglow 
Papers  "  to  Judge  Hoar.  "  A  very  fit  thing,"  he 
writes,  "  it  seems  to  me,  for  of  all  my  friends  he  is 
the  most  genuine  Yankee."  In  the  same  letter  he 
writes  with  eagerness  of  a  new  poetic  enterprise 
he  had  undertaken,  or  rather  of  an  old  one  revived.1 
"  I  have  been  working  hard,  and  if  my  liver  will 
let  me  alone,  as  it  does  now,  am  likely  to  go  on  all 
winter.  And  on  what  do  you  suppose  ?  I  have 
taken  up  one  of  the  unfinished  tales  of  the  '  Noon 
ing,'  and  it  grew  to  a  poem  of  near  seven  hundred 
lines  !  It  is  mainly  descriptive.  First,  a  sketch 
of  the  narrator,  then  his  '  prelude,'  then  his  '  tale.' 
I  describe  an  old  inn  and  its  landlord,  barroom, 
etc.  It  is  very  homely,  but  right  from  nature.  I 
have  lent  it  to  Child  and  hope  he  will  like  it,  for  if 
he  doesn't  I  shall  feel  discouraged.  It  was  very 
interesting  to  take  up  a  thread  dropt  so  long  ago, 
and  curious  as  a  phenomenon  of  memory  to  find 
how  continuous  it  had  remained  in  my  mind,  and 
how  I  could  go  on  as  if  I  had  let  it  fall  only  yes 
terday."  This  was  uFitz  Adam's  Story,"  which 
Mr.  Child  found  no  difficulty  in  liking,  so  that 
Lowell  sent  it  at  once  to  Mr.  Fields  for  the  Atlan 
tic,  where  it  appeared  in  January,  1867.  "  I  mean 

1  See  supra,  i.  300-302. 


POETRY  AND  PROSE  105 

to  work  ahead  as  fast  as  I  can  with  the  rest,"  he 
wrote  to  Mr.  Fields,  and  in  the  spirit  which  then 
possessed  him  he  had  high  hopes  of  completing 
"  The  Nooning,"  having  already,  as  we  have  seen, 
various  parts  of  it  ready  for  final  articulation.  He 
wrote  Mr.  Fields  again,  8  November,  1867,  when 
urged  to  send  more  of  the  poem  :  "  I  cannot  get 
into  the  mood  of  my  Nooning  story  just  now,"  but 
evidently  he  hoped  still  to  go  on  with  it,  for  he 
did  not  include  "  Fitz  Adam's  Story  "  in  his  next 
collection  of  poems  published  in  1869  ;  yet  when 
twenty  years  more  had  gone  by,  and  "  The  Noon 
ing  "  was  still  in  fragments,  he  saw  that  there  was 
no  likelihood  of  his  ever  producing  the  rounded 
whole,  and  so  included  "  Fitz  Adam's  Story  "  in 
his  latest  collection  with  an  apologetic  note. 

"  I  am  already  beginning  to  feel  the  relief  from 
those  confounded  recitations,"  he  wrote  a  month  or 
so  after  the  fall  term  at  college  began,  "  both  in 
better  health  and  better  spirits."  He  sent  Mr. 
Fields  not  only  this  poem  for  the  Atlantic,  but  a 
fairy  tale  and  a  poem  for  Our  Young  Folks. 
"  You  asked  me  once,"  he  writes,  "for  a  fairy 
story,  and  I  suppose  never  expected  to  hear  of  it 
again.  But  it  is  not  safe  to  cast  bread  on  my 
waters.  I  invented  a  kind  of  one  at  once,  and  yes 
terday  and  the  day  before  contrived  to  write  it, 
partly  to  spite  an  infernal  pain  I  was  suffering, 
and  which  got  me  under  at  last.  I  think  I  have 
told  it  simply  enough,  and  was  surprised  to  find 
how  easy  it  was  to  write  in  words  mostly  of  one 
syllable.  I  think  there  are  some  pleasant  humors 


106  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

in  it,  but  it  may  have  suffered  from  my  being  in 
such  a  wretched  condition  while  I  wrote  it.  Please 
read  it  yourself,  and  show  it  to  no  one.  To  tell  the 
honest  truth,  I  have  never  read  Our  Young  Folks, 
and  so  do  not  know  whether  it  is  suitable  or  not. 
Perhaps  I  could  write  it  over  again,  but  that  might 
spoil  it,  for  I  might  not  be  able  to  fancy  myself  so 
vividly  telling  it  again  as  I  did  before. 

"  Also :  I  have  a  jolly  little  poem  that  would  do 
for  a  Christmas  number,  called  '  Hob  Gobbling's 
Song,'  written  years  ago  for  my  nephews,  now  all 
dead.  Just  think  of  it !  and  three  of  the  four  in 
battle.  Who  could  have  dreamed  it  twenty  years 
ago? 

"  You  will  think  I  am  mad  to  bombard  you  thus, 
but  no,  I  am  only  beginning  to  feel  the  sort  of 
spring  impulse  of  my  college  freedom.  I  mean  to 
work  off  old  scores  this  winter  if  I  can." 

The  fairy  tale,  "Uncle  XMms's  Story,"  had 
pleasant  fancy  in  it,  but  was  curiously  literary  in 
its  allusions  and  in  its  thinly  concealed  moral  a 
parable  of  Lowell's  own  life,  with  its  struggle  for 
supremacy  of  the  two  fairies  Fan-ta-si-a  and  El-bo- 
gres.  The  song  might  fairly  be  called  a  New  Eng 
land  survival  of  Elizabethan  fairy  lore. 

As  a  result  of  his  industry  during  the  summer 
and  early  fall,  he  was  able  to  write  at  the  end  of 
October  :  "  I  have  in  my  pocket  $820  for  my  last 
six  weeks'  work,  and  mean  for  the  first  time  in  my 
life  to  make  an  investment  of  money  earned !  " 

The  pain,  by  the  way,  which  he  tried  to  assuage 
by  writing,  was  some  facial  trouble  which  resulted 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  107 

in  a  swelling  making  him  look,  as  he  said,  "like  a 
hornpout  with  the  mumps."  He  had  an  odd  ex 
perience  with  ether  which  he  thus  describes :  u  The 
ether  did  n't  deaden  the  pain  a  bit,  that  I  could 
discover.  Its  only  effect  was  to  make  my  head 
feel  as  if  it  were  violently  waggled  to  and  fro.  One 
odd  result  there  was.  For  a  moment,  I  lost  en 
tirely  my  present  personal  identity,  and  absolutely 
was  (without  anything  of  that  sense  of  dualism 
which  commonly  goes  along  with  and  criticises  hal 
lucination)  twelve  years  old  and  getting  ready  to 
go  out  shooting  as  I  used.  Odd  as  it  seems,  it  was 
a  most  painful  sensation,  and  all  the  rest  of  the 
night  I  was  haunted  by  a  feeling  that  my  life  was 
the  merest  illusion,  and  I  a  poor  puppet  worked  by 
some  humorous  higher  power,  who  could  by  a  jerk 
put  me  back  at  Mr.  Wells's  school  if  he  liked." 

In  the  midst  of  all  this  congenial  labor  he  was 
moved  also  to  write  one  more  political  article,  which 
appeared  in  the  North  American  for  October, 
1866.  The  President  and  the  Secretary  of  State 
had  formed  that  curious  combination  which  may 
be  said  still  somewhat  to  baffle  students  of  our  po 
litical  history,  and  Lowell  wrote  of  it,  —  the  last 
of  his  series  of  political  writings  growing  out  of 
the  great  conflict  and  the  early  movements  toward 
reconstruction.  Under  the  title,  "  The  Seward- 
Johnson  Keaction,"  he  examines  all  the  elements 
in  the  situation,  the  President,  the  Secretary,  Con 
gress,  and  the  two  parties,  and,  as  before,  his 
study  is  less  an  analysis  of  the  component  parts 
than  a  reassertion  of  those  fundamental  principles 


108  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

which  it  was  his  political  philosophy  to  seek  for 
and  expound.  Trust  in  the  people  was  the  prime 
article  of  his  creed ;  hence  he  sought  chiefly  for  evi 
dence  of  the  settled  drift  of  the  nation's  conviction, 
conscience,  and  instinct.  The  great  stake  played 
for  in  the  war  was,  in  his  words,  the  "  American 
ization  of  all  America,  nothing  more  and  nothing 
less."  Yet  with  all  his  clear  sight  of  the  ideal  and 
his  confidence  in  the  ultimate  reason  of  national 
thought,  Lowell  was  not  a  vague  theorist  nor  a 
contemner  of  political  activity.  On  the  contrary, 
one  of  the  most  impassioned  sentences  in  the  pa 
per  is  that  in  which  he  speaks  of  the  dignity  of  poli 
tics.  "  Now  that  the  signs  of  the  times,"  he  says, 
"  show  unmistakably  to  what  the  popular  mind  is 
making  itself  up,  they  [members  of  Congress]  have 
once  more  a  policy,  if  we  may  call  that  so  which  is 
only  a  calculation  of  what  it  would  be  '  safe  to  go 
before  the  people  with,'  as  they  call  it.  It  is  al 
ways  safe  to  go  before  them  with  plain  principles 
of  right,  and  with  the  conclusions  that  must  be 
drawn  from  them  by  common  sense,  though  this  is 
what  too  many  of  our  public  men  can  never  under 
stand.  Now  joiningji  Know-Nothing  '  lodge,'  now 
hanging  on  the  outskirts  of  a  Fenian  '  circle,'  they 
mistake  the  momentary  eddies  of  popular  whimsy 
for  the  great  current  that  sets  always  strongly  in 
one  direction  through  the  life  and  history  of  the 
nation.  Is  it,  as  foreigners  assert,  the  fatal  defect 
of  our  system  to  fill  our  highest  offices  with  men 
whose  views  in  politics  are  bounded  by  the  next 
district  election?  When  we  consider  how  noble 


POETRY   AND   PROSE  109 

the  science  is,  —  nobler  even  than  astronomy,  for  it 
deals  with  the  mutual  repulsions  and  attractions, 
not  of  inert  masses,  but  of  bodies  endowed  with 
thought  and  will,  calculates  moral  forces,  and  reck 
ons  the  orbits  of  God's  purposes  toward  mankind, 
—  we  feel  sure  that  it  is  to  find  nobler  teachers 
and  students,  and  to  find  them  even  here."  1 

With  this  paper  Lowell  took  leave  of  political 
writing  for  a  long  time.2  When  next  we  meet  him 
in  this  field  it  will  be  after  certain  practical  expe 
rience  in  the  field  of  politics  has  given  its  own 
color  to  his  mind.  Now,  as  if  he  had  shaken  off 
an  irksome  task,  he  turned  more  entirely  to  litera 
ture.  The  next  three  or  four  years  were  occupied, 
as  the  calendar  of  his  published  writings  shows, 
with  diligent  excursions  in  letters,  both  in  prose 
and  verse.  The  article  on  Percival  which  ap 
peared  in  the  North  American  for  January,  1867, 
was  an  amusing  treatment  of  a  commonplace  book, 
but  it  was  worth  preserving  for  its  humorous  pre 
sentation  of  the  touchstones  of  genuine  poetry ;  and 
from  what  Lowell  says  in  his  letters  of  the  slight 
personal  acquaintance  he  had  with  Percival,  it  is 

1  What  Lowell  thought  of  the  impeachment  business  may  be 
inferred  from  a  passage  in   a  letter  written   to  Mr.  Godkin,  20 
December,  1867  :  "  I  was  sorry  to  see  you  [in  the  Nation]  relax 
ing  a  little  about  impeachment.    For  myself,  I  have  seen  no  suffi 
cient  reason  to  change  my  old  opinion  of  its  folly.     They  remind 
me  of  the  boy's  playing  at  hanging,  who  finds  he  has  done  it  all 
right,  —  only  forgotten  to  cut  himself  down.     We  might  be  able 
to  stand  it,  we  are  a  wonderful  people,  of  course,  but  the  other 
lesson  of  standing  A.  J.  to  the  end  of  his  tether  is  worth  ten  of 
this.     The  South  is  as  mad  now  as  it  ever  will  be." 

2  With  a  single  exception,  for  which  see  infra,  p.  122. 


110  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

quite  likely  that  the  encounter  gave  a  little  fillip  to 
his  interest ;  yet  one  may  be  permitted  to  look  a 
little  more  closely  and  find  in  Lowell's  character 
ization  of  the  poetic  temperament  and  sentimental- 
ism,  when  laid  bare  through  the  absence  of  the 
clothing  of  sound  sense  and  humor,  a  distant  re 
flection  on  weaknesses  of  which  he  was  conscious 
when  in  the  depressed  mood.  There  was  an  as 
similating  faculty  which  he  possessed  that  led  him, 
when  reading  lives  and  records  especially  of  liter 
ary  careers,  to  suffer  somewhat  as  the  young  stu 
dent  of  medicine  who  is  never  quite  sure  that  he  is 
not  acting  as  a  sort  of  proxy  for  the  cases  whose 
diagnosis  is  laid  before  him.  It  is  curious  to  find 
Lowell,  when  engaged  on  Lessing's  life  and  works, 
which  he  reviewed  in  the  April  North  American, 
writing  to  Mr.  Norton : 1  "  I  find  somewhat  to  my 
surprise  from  his  letters  that  he  had  the  imagina 
tive  temperament  in  all  its  force.  Can't  work  for 
months  together,  if  he  tries,  his  forehead  drips  with 
angstschweiss  ;  feels  ill  and  looks  well  —  in  short, 
is  as  pure  a  hypochondriac  as  the  best.  This  has 
had  a  kind  of  unhealthy  interest  for  me,  for  I 
never  read  my  own  symptoms  so  well  described 
before."  And  the  article  itself,  if  one  reads  it 
with  Lowell's  thought  about  himself  in  mind,  be 
comes  a  curiously  parallel  record,  even  to  exter 
nal  circumstances,  of  the  two  men.  It  would,  of 
course,  be  untrue  to  say  that  Lowell  was  thinking 
of  himself  when  he  was  writing  of  Lessing,  but  I 
cannot  help  suspecting,  as  I  read  the  article,  that 
1  Letters,  i.  349. 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  111 

there  was  a  subconsciousness  which  gave  a  force  to 
certain  passages,  and  that  Lowell's  interest  in  his 
subject  was  heightened  by  the  plucking  at  his 
sleeve  of  his  own  memories  and  ambitions. 

In  writing  for  the  North  American  the  articles 
on  great  literature  which  were  afterward  reproduced 
in  his  books,  Lowell  was  not  only  drawing  upon 
a  liberal  familiarity  with  most  of  the  subjects  from 
repeated  readings,  but  he  was  sometimes  availing 
himself  of  earlier  treatment  in  the  form  of  lectures 
which  he  had  given  in  connection  with  his  college 
work.  He  complains,  when  preparing  his  article 
on  Eousseau,  that  he  is  always  bothered  when  he  . 
tries  to  do  anything  with  old  material,  as  he  was 
in  this  case,  inserting  in  his  paper  patches  from 
college  lectures ;  and  any  one  who  has  had  the 
experience  appreciates  the  difficulty  of  turning  the 
oratio  directa  of  the  lecture  into  the  oratio  obliqua 
of  the  essay,  —  to  mention  but  one  of  the  "bothers" 
of  such  work.  But  a  comparison  of  the  manu 
script  of  Lowell's  college  lecture  with  the  text  of 
the  printed  article  shows  two  things :  first,  that  in 
going  back  to  his  old  lecture,  Lowell  easily  took 
fire  from  his  own  words  and,  in  copying  a  sen 
tence,  ran  on  into  a  fuller,  more  finished  conclusion. 
For  example,  in  comparing  the  sonnets  of  Petrarch 
with  those  of  Michelangelo,  he  says  alike  in  lecture 
and  in  article  :  "In  them  (i.  e.  in  Michelangelo's) 
the  airiest  pinnacles  of  sentiment  and  speculation 
are  buttressed  with  solid  mason-work  of  thought, 
of  an  actual,  not  fancied  experience."  In  the  lec 
ture,  he  goes  on  :  "  You  seem  to  feel  the  great 


112  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

architect  in  them.  Petrarch's  in  comparison  are 
like  the  sugared  frostwork  upon  cake."  In  the 
article,  however,  he  adds  to  "  fancied  experience," 
"and  the  depth  of  feeling  is  measured  by  the 
sobriety  and  reserve  of  expression,  while  in  Pe 
trarch's  all  ingenuousness  is  frittered  away  into 
ingenuity.  Both  are  cold,  but  the  coldness  of  the 
one  is  self-restraint,  while  the  other  chills  with 
pretence  of  warmth.  In  Michelangelo's  you  feel 
the  great  architect :  in  Petrarch's  the  artist  who 
can  best  realize  his  conception  in  the  limits  of 
a  cherry-stone."  l 

Again,  it  is  evident  from  the  comparison  that 
Lowell's  direct  address  in  speaking  to  his  class 
from  the  written  lecture  was  in  form  of  sentences 
little  different  from  what  he  used  when  writing 
for  the  public.  In  each  case,  his  spontaneity  was 
uppermost ;  he  was  not  especially  aware,  as  he 
wrote,  either  of  audience  or  of  readers.  In  revis 
ing  his  articles  for  book  publication  he  altered 
the  impersonal  we,  of  the  reviewer  to  the  /of  the 
author,  and  in  doing  so  merely  strengthened  the 
natural  voice  in  which  he  spoke.  Such  papers  as 
"  A  Good  Word  for  Winter,"  or  "  My  Garden 
Acquaintance,"  are  scarcely  more  direct  in  the  re 
lation  of  author  and  reader  than  are  those  papers 
which  have  the  external  form  of  book  reviews.  It 
was  the  personality  of  the  man  at  home  in  a  hos 
pitable  manner  that  found  this  expression,  and  just 
as  some  of  his  happiest  letters  were  written  to  per 
sons  whom  he  scarcely  knew,  but  happened  to  be 
1  "Rousseau,"  in  Literary  Essays,  ii.  256. 


POETRY   AND   PROSE  113 

called  out  by  some  apt  occasion,  so  he  wrote  and 
lectured,  except  on  the  most  formal  themes,  with  a 
freedom  which  was  neither  disturbed  nor  excited 
by  audience  or  readers.  One  may  notice  a  differ 
ence  in  this  respect  between  the  political  papers 
and  the  literary  essays.  The  I  scarcely  is  at  home 
in  the  former. 

The  Dante  Club  had  finished  its  task,  and  Long 
fellow's  translation  was  published  in  1867.  The 
affectionate  relation  between  the  two  men  found 
more  than  one  poetic  expression  during  their  long 
neighborly  existence,  and  when  Longfellow's  six 
tieth  birthday  occurred  in  1867  Lowell  wrote  a 
poem,  and  printed  it  in  the  daily  paper  which  he 
knew  would  be  laid  on  Longfellow's  breakfast^ 
table.  On  the  appearance  of  the  Dante  he  wrote, 
with  Mr.  Norton,  a  joint  review  which  appeared  in 
the  North  American.  Of  his  own  brief  part  he 
wrote  in  humorous  dismay  to  his  collaborator :  "I 
could  only  wish  that  the  latter  part  had  been  more 
critical  if  it  were  but  for  Longfellow's  sake.  It 's 
lucky,  perhaps,  that  I  got  almost  crazy  over  the 
insertion  I  was  to  make  in  it,  or  I  should  have 
rushed  into  the  thing  myself  —  for,  though  I  think 
his  version  (as  you  know)  truly  admirable,  there 
are  some  things  to  be  questioned  in  it.  However, 
all  the  better  that  I  could  n't.  I  say  I  was  almost 
crazy.  You  see  I  went  up  to  Shady  Hill  —  pick 
ing  up  Longfellow  on  the  way — and  it  was  very 
hot,  and  I  brought  away  an  armful  of  translations, 
just  cutting  out  Howells,  who  was  on  the  same 
errand.  I  came  home  with  my  prize,  wet  through 


114  JAMES   RUSSELL   LOWELL 

with  the  only  sure  result  of  all  earthly  toils,  and 
began  to  compare.  Good  heavens  !  I  had  Cayley 
and  Ford,  and  Dayman  and  Ramsay  (and  lots  of 
others  that  made  me  '  d — '  say),  and  Brooksbank 
and  Wright,  and  last  Rossetti.  Well,  I  addled  my 
brains  over  'em  —  my  tables  were  heaped,  my  floor 
stumbly  with  my  a- versions,  as  I  called  them  when 
I  looked  at  them,  my  in-versions  when  I  read  them. 
Now,  to  begin  with,  I  have  read  Dante  so  much  that 
I  can't  remember  a  line  of  him  —  in  short,  't  was 
infandum  renovare  dolorem.  I  spent  three  days 
in  bothering  through  what  will  make  two  pages." 

The  critical  reviews  of  Longfellow's  Dante  from 
the  hands  of  competent  scholars  were  few,  but 
one  published  in  a  daily  journal  called  out  a  let 
ter  from  Lowell  to  the  friend  who  sent  it  to  him, 
which  gives  with  frankness  Lowell's  estimate  of 
the  translation.  "  The  review,"  he  writes,  "  does 
not  change  my  opinion  of  Mr.  Longfellow's  trans 
lation  —  not  as  the  best  possible,  by  any  means, 
but  as  the  best  probable.  .  .  .  Nobody  who  is  in 
timate  with  the  original  will  find  any  translation 
of  the  '  Divina  Commedia '  more  refreshing  than 
cobs.  Has  not  Dante  himself  told  us  that  no 
poetry  can  be  translated  ?  But,  after  all  is  said,. 
I  think  Mr.  Longfellow's  the  best  thus  far  as  being 
the  most  accurate.  It  is  to  be  looked  on,  I  think, 
as  measured  prose  —  like  our  version^  of 'Job,  for 
example,  though  without  that  mastery  of  measure 
in  which  our  Bible  translators  are  unmatched  ex 
cept  by  Milton.  I  mean  where  they  are  at  their 
best,  as  in  Job,  the  songs  of  Deborah  and  Barak, 


POETRY   AND   PROSE  115 

the  death  of  Sisera,  and  some  parts  of  the  Psalms. 
Mr.  Longfellow  is  not  a  scholar  in  the  German 
sense  of  the  word,  that  is  to  say,  he  is  no  pedant, 
but  he  certainly  is  a  scholar  in  another  and  per 
haps  a  higher  sense,  I  mean  in  range  of  acquire 
ment  and  the  flavor  that  comes  of  it." 

Specific  criticism,  with  all  the  painstaking  of 
which  he  was  capable,  was  but  the  obverse  of  the 
medal  which  Lowell  struck  in  his  literary  work. 
On  the  face  was  his  generous  delight  in  his  books. 
"  The  Nightingale  in  the  Study,"  written  in  the 
summer  of  1867,  holds  in  capital  form  a  genuine 
confession  that  there  was  an  appeal  to  him  from 
nature  in  literature  which  did  not  antagonize  the 
appeal  made  to  him  by  the  world  of  natural  beauty, 
yet  sometimes  constrained  and  invited  him  in  tones 
he  could  not  resist,  even  though  the  birds  without 
were  calling  him.  Mr.  Leslie  Stephen  who  visited 
him  in  the  summer  of  1868,  renewing  an  acquaint 
ance  begun  five  years  earlier  and  ripening  into  a 
friendship  which  meant  much  to  Lowell  ever  after, 
has  given  a  pleasant  account  of  the  impression 
made  upon  him  by  the  poet  in  his  study  at  Elm- 
wood.  "All  round  us,"  he  says,  "  were  the  crowded 
book-shelves,  whose  appearance  showed  them  to  be 
the  companions  of  the  true  literary  workman,  not 
of  the  mere  dilettante  or  fancy  biographer,  t  Their 
ragged  bindings  and  thumbed  pages  scored  with 
frequent  pencil  marks  implied  that  they  were  a 
student's  tools,  not  mere  ornamental  playthings. 
He  would  sit  among  his  books,  pipe  in  mouth,  a 
book  in  hand,  hour  after  hour  ;  and  I  was  soon 


116  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

intimate  enough  to  sit  by  him  and  enjoy  intervals 
of  silence  as  well  as  periods  of  discussion  and  al 
ways  delightful  talk."  1 

It  was  a  quarter  of  a  century  since  Lowell  had 
collected  his  fugitive  poems,  though  he  had  mean 
time  published  the  second  series  of  "  The  Biglow 
Papers,"  and  when  1868  came  in  he  was  moved 
to  make  a  new  volume  which  should  include  the 
poems  he  had  been  printing,  chiefly  in  the  Atlantic. 
It  was  with  this  in  mind  that  he  took  up  a  frag 
ment  of  a  poem  written  a  score  of  years  before, 
rewrote  and  added  to  it,  designing  to  make  it  the 
title  poem  in  the  volume.  He  printed  it  first  in 
the  June  Atlantic,  under  the  title  "  A  June  Idyll." 
In  sending  it  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Fields :  "  In  the  first 
flush  of  having  just  finished  and  copied  it  (for 
which  I  was  obliged  to  miss  Dickens  last  night) 
I  am  inclined  to  think  there  is  something  charac 
teristic.  .  .  .  Surely  there  are  good  bits  in  it,  and 
it  is  good  for  more  than  usual,  or  good  for  nothing. 
If  I  have  n't  made  a  spoon,  I  have  certainly  spoiled 
a  horn  that  would  have  turned  out  a  very  good 
one.  You  sometimes  find  fault  with  my  names.  I 
have  called  this  4  A  June  Idyll,'  which  is  just  what 
it  is.  Do  you  object  ?  " 

Mr.  Fields,  either  himself  or  through  a  friend, 
wrote  a  very  appreciative  notice  of  the  poem  in  the 
Boston  Advertiser,  which  drew  from  Lowell  this 
response  to  his  friendly  editor :  — 

"  Such  a  notice  of  my  Iddle 

Met  my  eyes  in  the  Advertiser  ! 

1  Letters,  i.  408. 


POETRY   AND   PROSE  117 

"  To  order,'  thought  I,  '  no,  fiddle ! 
'T  is  the  dull  world  growing  wiser. 

"  '  My  forehead  they  twine  with  bayses, 

They  're  eager  to  shout  hosanna, 
My  style  as  pure  epic  they  praises 
Where  they  used  to  add  acuanha.' 

"  '  'T  is  always  their  fate  whom  at  christening 

Your  genuine  Helicon  's  spilt  on  ; 
Long  ears  are  the  latest  at  listening, 
Vide  Wordsworth  pass  i m  on  Milton.' 

"  So  I  read  it  aloud  to  my  family, 

One  delicate  phrase  after  t'  other, 
And  surely  the  good  little  Sammle  he 
Was  n't  sadder  at  leaving  his  mother 

"  Than  I  when  I  came  to  the  close  of  it, 

For  I  wanted,  as  I  'm  a  sinner, 
(Such  poetry  seemed  in  the  prose  of  it) 
To  keep  up  my  reading  till  dinner. 

"  But  now,  oh  worst  of  collapses, 

My  Temple  of  Fame  is  in  ruins, 
Its  forecourt,  nave,  transept,  and  apse  is 
A  shelter  for  foxes  and  bruins  ! 

"  For  all  of  my  Public  Opinion 

With  the  wind  in  its  sails  to  drive  it 
To  the  port  of  supreme  dominion 
Turns  out  most  especially  private. 

"  My  Fame's  accoucheur  sadly  yields  his 

Place  up  to  the  Deputy  Cor'ner, 
For  my  Public  Opinion  was  Fields's, 

My  tradewind  a  puff  from  the  '  Corner.'  " 

That  the  poem  at  once  found  disinterested  friends 
is  evident  from  the  letter  which  Lowell  writes  in 
acknowledgment  of  the  praise  which  the  poet,  Dr. 


118  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Parsons,  gave  it.  "  Something  more  than  half  of 
it,"  Lowell  says,  "  was  written  more  than  twenty 
years  ago,  on  the  death  of  our  eldest  daughter; 
but  when  I  came  to  complete  it,  that  other  death, 
which  broke  my  life  in  two,  would  come  in  against 
my  will,  so  that  you  were  right  in  your  surmise.  I 
was  very  glad  you  liked  it,  and  your  letter  touched 
me  deeply,  as  you  may  well  conceive." 

In  September  Lowell  made  out  a  tentative  list 
of  the  poems  to  be  included  in  the  volume,  and 
wrote  to  Mr.  Fields :  "  I  think  it  best  not  to  in 
clude  any  humorous  poems  in  this  collection.  They 
can  come  by  and  by,  if  they  are  wanted.  They 
would  jar  here.  Some  I  may  be  able  to  shorten 
somewhat  in  printing,  but  commonly  I  find  it  hard 
work  to  improve  them  after  they  are  dry,  though 
I  seem  to  see  well  enough  where  and  how  much 
they  need  it.  The  poems  of  the  war  I  shall  put  by 
themselves  at  the  end,  so  as  to  close  with  the  Ode 
as  I  begin  with  the  Idyll.  How  I  do  wish  the 
whole  of  them  were  better  —  now  that  I  am  put 
ting  them  between  stiff  covers  to  help  them  stand 
alone !  '  Bad  is  the  best '  is  a  good  proverb  —  but 
how  if  the  best  is  bad  ?  Well,  here  and  there  one 
catches  a  good  strain,  but  I  feel  very  hopeless 
about  them." 

Lowell  meant  to  call  his  volume  "  A  June  Idyll 
and  other  Poems,"  but  Mr.  Fields  pointed  out  that 
Whittier's  new  volume  just  about  to  appear  was  to 
carry  the  title  of  "A  Summer ' Idyll."  *  Lowell 

1  After  all  Whittier  changed  his  mind  and  gave  his  book  the 
title  "  Among  the  Hills." 


POETRY   AND   PROSE  119 

retorted :  "  Why  the  devil  should  Whittier  bag 
my  title  ?  I  can't  claim  a  copyright  in  '  Idyll,'  that 
is  in  the  dictionary  —  but,  June  'Idyll*  was  mine. 
It  will  be  thought  his  poem  suggested  mine,  as  it 
was  with  the  '  Present  Crisis,'  though  mine  was 
written  two  years  before.  However,  J.  G.  W.  is 
welcome  to  anything  of  mine,  for  he  is  a  trump, 
and  after  all  the  milk  is  spilt.  But  if  his  volume 
is  not  advertised,  might  I  not  insist  ?  It  's  of 
more  consequence  to  me  than  to  him,  for  I  have 
nothing  else  that  will  look  so  well  in  the  vanguard. 
But  if  it  's  all  up,  how  would  '  Appledore  and 
other  Poems  '  do  ?  It  is  a  pretty  name  enough, 
and  the  poem  is  one  of  my  longest,  —  though  not, 
perhaps,  the  one  I  would  otherwise  have  put  first. 
My  dedication,  I  think,  is  good,  and  that  will  take 
the  edge  off." 

Mr.  Fields  suggested  that  he  should  give  the 
volume  the  title  of  his  place,  "  Elmwood,"  but 
Lowell  replied :  "  I  can't  bear  '  Elmwood,'  and 
the  more  I  think  of  it,  the  more  I  can't  bear  it  — 
't  is  turning  one's  household  gods  upon  the  town, 
as  it  were.  No,  never!  They  have  endured  me 
for  fifty  years,  and  I  won't  desert  'em  in  their  old 
age.  Let  me  have  my  hermitage  to  myself.  (I  had 
eight  visitors  this  morning  —  one  of  whom  wanted 
me  to  read  '  The  Biglow  Papers '  to  him.)  But  I 
have  it  now.  Instead  of  'June  Idyll,'  which  was  the 
2ns  oiler  of  a  prosaic  mind,  I  shall  call  it  '  Under 
the  Willows.'  Like  all  great  discoveries,  it  is  sim 
ple,  and,  you  may  depend  upon  it,  it  is  the  thing. 
It  means  everything  and  nothing.  I  can't  make 


120  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  poem  over  so  as  to  suit  4  Elmwood,'  and  so  I 
shall  settle  upon  this,  fixed  as  a  butterfly,  stable  as 
the  Horse-railway  stables.  You  can't  move  me. 
The  man  that  moved  Chicago  could  n't  move  me. 
I  am  happy,  and  discharge  my  mind  of  the  whole 
concern.  I  shall  now  devote  my  evening  to  the 
4  Flying  Dutchman '  in  peace,  and  write  you  some 
thing  clever  for  the  Atlantic.  I  snap  my  fingers  at 
you  and  Bazin,1  wore  he  even  the  helmet  of  Mam- 
brino.  Nothing  can '  touch  me  further.  '  Under 
the  Willows  and  other  Poems '  -  -  it  satisfies  every 
want,  and  will  be  immensely  popular.  The  basket- 
makers  will  buy  up  the  first  edition  and  the  gun 
powder  makers  the  second.  Then  comes  the  gen 
eral  public,  mad  with  curiosity  to  know  what  the 
d — 1  I  mean.  I  am  charmed  with  my  own  powers 
of  invention.  A  duller  man  would  have  said 
4  Under  the  Elms,'  or  some  such  things.  Let  me 
alone  for  tickling  the  fancy  of  a  purchaser.  / 
know  what  they  want." 

To  Mr.  Norton  he  writes,  reciting  his  tribula 
tions  over  the  name  of  his  book,  and  adds :  "  I  was 
suddenly  moved  to  finish  my  4  Voyage  to  Vinland,' 
part  of  which  you  remember  was  written  eighteen 
years  ago.2  I  meant  to  have  made  it  much  longer, 
but  maybe  it  is  better  as  it  is.  I  clapt  a  begin 
ning  upon  it,  patched  it  in  the  middle,  and  then 
got  to  what  had  always  been  my  favorite  part  of 
the  plan.  This  was  to  be  a  prophecy  by  Gudrida, 
a  woman  who  went  with  them,  of  the  future  Amer- 

1  The  bookbinder  who  wanted  the  lettering  for  the  volume. 

2  Originally  designed  to  make  part  of  The  Nooning. 


Elmwood 


122  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

attitude  of  listening  and  observing  which  sometimes 
belongs  to  home-keeping  wits.  "  A  Certain  Con 
descension  in  Foreigners,"  though  it  was  at  first 
sight  a  clearing  of,  his  mind  such  as  his  letters  re 
peatedly  show,  grows  warm  with  that  passion  for 
his  country  and  the  ideas  it  stood  for,  which  had 
been  burned  into  him  by  his  personal  experience 
in  the  war  and  by  his  constant  brooding  over  the 
deep  realities  which  underlay  the  meaning  of  the 
war.  He  returned  to  political  writing  under  stress 
of  need  for  copy  in  the  January  North  American 
with  "  A  Look  Before  and  After."  The  Review 
itself  had  become  somewhat  more  of  a  burden  to 
him,  for  Mr.  Norton  went  abroad  in  the  summer 
of  1868  for  an  indefinite  stay,  and  though  Mr. 
E.  W.  Gurney,  who  took  his  place,  was  competent, 
Lowell  felt  the  responsibility  rather  more  than 
when  he  had  easily  left  the  main  business  to  Mr. 
Norton.  Moreover,  the  special  work  which  he  and 
his  friend  had  undertaken  had,  in  a  measure,  been 
accomplished,  and  the  Review,  though  winning  a 
succes  tfestinw,  had  not  that  worldly  success  which 
reconciles  one  to  drudgery.  There  is  a  half-vexed, 
half-humorous  letter  to  Mr.  Fields,  dated  Elmwood 
10  P.  M.  Thursday,  1868,  which  was  24  September. 
"  The  express  has  just  brought,"  he  writes,  "  your 
note  asking  for  the  log  of  the  North  American  on 
her  present  voyage.  The  N.  A.  is  teak-built,  her 
extreme  length  from  stem  to  stern  post  299  feet 
6  inches,  and  her  beam  (I  mean  her  breadth  of 
beam)  286  feet  7  inches  and  a  quarter.  She  is  an 
A  1  risk  at  the  Antediluvian.  These  statements 


POETRY  AND  PROSE  123 

will  enable  you  to  reckon  her  possible  rate  of  sail 
ing.  During  the  present  trip  I  should  say  that 
all  the  knots  she  made  were  Gordian,  and  of  the 
tightest  sort.  I  extract  from  log  as  follows  :  — 

"11  July.  Lat.  42°  1',  the  first  officer,  Mr. 
Norton,  lost  overboard  in  a  fog,  with  the  compass, 
caboose,  and  studden-sails  in  his  pocket,  also  the 
key  of  the  spirit-room. 

"  25  July.  Lat.  42°  10',  spoke  the  Ark,  Cap 
tain  Noah,  and  got  the  latest  news.  26,  27,  28, 
dead  calm.  29,  30,  31,  and  1  August,  head  winds 
N.  N.  E.  to  N.  E.  by  N.  15  August.  Double  reef 
in  foretopsl,  spoke  the  good  ship  Argo,  Jason  com 
mander,  from  Colchos  with  wool. 

"  17  August,  dead  calm,  schooner  Pinta,  Capt. 
Columbus,  bound  for  the  New  World,  and  a  market, 
bearing  Sou  Sou  West  half  South  on  our  weather 
bow.  Got  some  stores  from  him. 

"  20.  Capt.  Lowell  cut  his  throat  with  the  fluke 
of  the  sheet  anchor. 

"  So  far  the  log. 

"  Now  for  the  comment.  Toward  the  1st  Sep 
tember  I  received  notice  that  the  Review  was  at  a 
standstill.  Mr.  Gurney  was  at  Beverly,  ill  and 
engaged  to  be  married.  I  had  not  a  line  of  copy, 
nor  knew  where  to  get  one.  I  communicated  with 
G.  and  got  what  he  had  —  viz :  two  articles,  one 
on  Herbert  Spencer,  and  t'other  on  Leibnitz.  I 
put  the  former  in  type,  but  did  not  dare  to  follow 
with  the  latter,  for  I  thought  it  would  be  too  much 
even  for  the  readers  of  the  N.  A.  By  and  by,  I 
raked  together  one  or  two  more,  —  not  what  I 


124  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

•would  have  but  what  I  could.  James's  article  on 
4  Spanish  G.' 1  is  good  and  ought  to  go  in.  So  of 
the  Siege  of  Delhi.  We  want  something  inter 
esting,  and  we  must  have  some  literary  notices. 
As  I  receive  none  of  the  books,  of  course  I  had  to 
depend  on  others  for  these,  and  I  have  got  as  many 
as  I  could.  I  have  edited  the  number  for  October 
because  it  was  absolutely  necessary,  —  not,  surely, 
because  I  desired  it.  I  have  read  all  the  proof 
and  have  done  all  that  I  agreed  not  to  do  when  I 
made  my  engagement  with  Crosby  &  Nichols. 
All  I  promised  to  give  them  was  my  name  on  the 
cover,  and  I  supposed  T.  &  F.  succeeded  to  their 
agreement.  I  have  much  more  than  kept  my 
word.  The  October  number  can't  be  printed  by 
Saturday. 

"  But  I  am  altogether  willing  that  it  should  be, 
only  in  that  case  my  name  must  be  withdrawn  from 
the  cover.  I  never  desired  to  be  its  *  editor,  and  I 
put  my  resignation  in  your  hands.  Get  some  bet 
ter  man,  say ,  who  can  write  on  all  subjects 

equally  ill  at  a  moment's  notice.  I  wash  my 
hands  of  the  whole  concern.  I  will  read  the  rest 
of  the  proof  of  this  number  if  you  wish,  for  that  is 
in  the  bond,  but  for  January  look  out  for  somebody 
who  can  make  something  out  of  nothing.  I  recom 
mend  ."  Six  days  later  he  wrote  again  :  — 

"  Correct  estimates  from  log  thus  :  25  Septem 
ber.  Lat.  42°  10'.  Captain  Lowell  committed 
suicide  by  blowing  out  his  brains  with  the  gaff- 
topsl  halyards.  There  can  be  no  doubt  of  the  fact, 

1  George  Eliot's  The  Spanish  Gipsy. 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  125 

as  the  2nd  officer  recognized  the  brains  for  his 
(Cap.  L.'s),  he  being  familiar  with  them. 

"  30  September.  Captain  L.  reappeared  on  the 
deck,  having  only  been  below  to  oversee  the  storage 
of  ballast,  whereof  on  this  trip  the  lading  mainly 
consists.  What  was  thought  to  be  his  brains 
turned  out  on  closer  examination  to  be  pumpkin 
pie,  though  the  second  officer  was  unconvinced  and 
the  Captain  himself  could  not  make  up  his  mind. 

"  The  fact  is  I  was  cross,  and  did  not  quite  like 
being  brought  up  with  such  a  round  turn  at  my 
time  of  life.  I  had  done  all  I  could,  and  was 
hoping  that  the  literary  notices  would  make  up  for 
the  rest.  I  had  been  disappointed  in  three  body 
articles  by  Bigelow,  Poole,  and  Willard  (on  von 
Bismarck).  Gurney  will  take  hold  of  the  next 
number  and  it  will  all  go  right.  Say  beforehand 
how  many  sheets  you  are  willing  to  allow,  and  we 
will  keep  as  near  the  wind  as  we  can,  but  don't  — 
well,  never  mind,  but  I  am  as  touchy  as  if  I  were 
even  poorer  than  I  am." 

The  publication  of  "  Under  the  Willows  " 
brought  Lowell  some  of  those  expressions  of  ad 
miration  and  affection  for  which  the  friends  of  a 
writer  gladly  use  such  occasions.  The  publishing 
of  a  book  is  like  an  announcement  of  an  engage 
ment,  —  an  opportunity  for  one's  friends  to  show 
their  affection  unreservedly.  Among  the  notes 
which  pleased  Lowell  was  one  from  Mr.  Aldrich 
who  had  lately  come  to  Boston  to  edit  Every  Sat 
urday,  and  in  his  pleasure  he  sent  a  copy  of  the 
special  edition  of  the  Commemoration  Ode  with 
this  letter. 


126  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

ELMWOOD,  23rd  December,  1868. 

MY  DEAR  SIR,  —  That  note  was  so  pleasant  to 
an  old  fellow  who  does  n't  think  too  well  of  him 
self,  that  I  can't  help  (with  a  very  good  will  and  a 
very  balky  pen)  telling  you  how  much  pleasure  it 
gave  me.  That  I  don't  deserve  all  the  fine  things 
you  say  of  me  does  n't  make  it  any  the  less  friendly 
in  you  to  say  them,  and  I,  for  one,  frankly  confess 
that  I  like  a  little  lubrication  now  and  then.  It 
makes  our  machine  (as  they  used  to  call  it  in  the 
last  century)  run  easier  for  a  day  or  two,  till  its 
general  ramshackliness  reproduces  the  familiar 
friction. 

Now  lest  the  twins  should  repeat  the  tragedy  of 
Eteocles  and  Polynikes,  and  the  house  of  Aldrich 
be  extinguished  in  an  internecine  duel  for  the  pos 
session  of  that  other  fatal  volume,  I  send  what  will 
enable  your  paternal  anxiety  to  make  a  fair  divi 
sion  between  them.  If  they  are  proper  twins  (I 
am  a  kind  of  twins  myself  divided  between  grave 
and  gay)  they  will  be  the  one  sentimental  and 
t'  other  humorous.  Bequeath  one  sacred  tome  to 
each,  and  keep  for  yourself  the  cordial  feeling  that 
sends  both. 

This  which  you  now  receive  has  at  least  the 
value  of  rarity.  It  is  one  of  twelve  copies  printed 
in  this  form.  Think  of  me  after  I  am  gone  on 
(for  in  the  nature  of  things  you  will  survive  me) 
as  one  who  had  a  really  friendly  feeling  for  every 
thing  human.  It  is  better  to  be  a  good  fellow  than 
a  good  poet,  and  perhaps  (I  am  not  sure)  I  might 
have  shown  a  pretty  fair  talent  that  way,  with 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  127 

proper  encouragement.  Any  how,  I  wish  you  and 
Mrs.  Aldrich,  and  the  Twins  a  Merry  Christmas, 
and  am  Cordially  yours, 

J.  K.  LOWELL. 

That  Lowell  himself  knew  how  to  give  pleasure 
with  praise  is  evident  enough  from  the  several 
letters  which  Mr.  Norton  has  printed,  to  Mr.  Al 
drich,  to  Mr.  Howells,  to  Mr.  Gilder,  and  to  other 
younger  writers.  He  was  constantly  sending  plea 
sant  messages  and  writing  notes  with  unaffected 
expressions  of  enjoyment,  and  his  friendly  feeling 
made  it  easy  for  the  editor  of  the  Atlantic  to  con 
sult  him  with  'reference  to  contributions  even  from 
strangers.  Thus  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Howells :  "  I 
would  be  burned  at  the  stake  —  nay,  I  would  agree 
to  be  shut  up  alone  for  an  hour  with  -  -  before  I 
would  acknowledge  (I  spelt  it  without  a  d !)  a 
poem  to  be  good  unless  it  was  so.  I  would  be 

burned  at  two  stakes,  and  be  shut  up  with  

and ere  I  would  say  a  good  word  for  the  verses 

of  a  rising  young  author.  But  I  expect  to  see  and 
like  your  poem  in  the  next  Atlantic.  It  is  good, 
despite  Mrs.  Howells  and  the  anapests,  —  or  what 
ever  other  kind  of  pests  they  were. 

"  Go  by  your  ear,  my  dear  boy,  or  by  Madam's 

and  leave  Latin  prosodies  to  and  the  other 

profound  scholars  who  understand  'em,  but  be  sure 
that  the  plot  of  your  little  poem  is  so  charming 
that  it  will  take  all  the  lovers  and  loved,  and  who 
else  is  worth  caring  for  ? 

"  I  tried  it  on  Mrs.  Lowell  (you  know  we  have 


128  JAMES   RUSSELL   LOWELL 

a  bit  of  Darby  and  Joan  left  in  us  still)  and  she 
purred  at  once.  No  :  it  is  good  and  subtle  (or 
subtile,  I  don't  know  which,  thanks  to  Mr.  Nich 
ols),  but  it  is  either  you  like. 

"  P.  S.  You  have  a  real  vein,  so  don't  be  both 
ered,  but  make  it  as  good  as  you  can  and  thank 
the  gods." 

And  again,  in  answer  to  some  questions  Mr. 
Howells  had  asked  him  respecting  the  Isles  of 
Shoals,  apropos  of  the  articles  by  Mrs.  Thaxter 
then  to  appear  in  the  Atlantic :  "  '  Londoner's  '  is 
right.  The  names  of  the  islands  are  '  Haley's,' 
otherwise  (and  better)  4  Smutty-nose,'  4  Star,'  al 
ways  called  4  Star-island,'  '  Hog,'  which  Mrs.  T.  no 
doubt  calls  '  Appledore,'  —  the  name  of  a  village 
that  once  stood  on  it,  —  '  Cedar,'  '  White,'  *  Mal 
aga,'  and  '  Duck.'  There  you  have  'em  all. 

"  Now  I  have  a  favor  to  ask  of  you  —  Se  io 
meritai  di  voi  assai  o  poco  —  and  that  is  to  have 
the  sheets  of  the  life  of  Landor  sent  me.  I  guess 
I  could  make  something  out  of  them,  which  per 
haps  you  boys  hardly  could.  By  the  way,  I  was 
very  much  pleased  with  your  notice  of  that  fellow's 
(Sebright,1  I  think)  Congressional  reminiscences. 
It  made  me  laugh,  and  was  so  fine  (so  subtile)  that 
the  man  himself,  despite  his  name,  will  never  feel 
the  edge  of  it.  I  always  had  great  expectations 
of  you,  —  but  I  am  beginning  to  believe  in  you  for 
good.  You  are  the  only  one  that  has  n't  cheated 
me  by  your  blossom.  I  like  your  flavor  now,  as 
once  I  did  your  perfume.  You  young  fellows  are 

1  It  was  Gobright's  Recollections. 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  129 

dreadfully  irreverent — but  don't  you  laugh  —  I 
take  a  kind  of  credit  to  myself  in  being  the  first  to 
find  you  out.  I  am  proud  of  you.  But  see  how 
Fate  takes  me  down  !  As  I  wrote  the  words,  it 
began  to  rain  on  my  hay.  Absit  omen.  And  may 
it  be  long  before  you  are  mown  ! 

"  As  for  your  gigantic  boongalong  there  in  Bos 
ton,  —  I  fancy  it  is  like  Niagara,  a  thing  that  one 
can  reckon  mathematically.  It  is  but  one  voice 
raised  to  the  nth  power  or  so.  And  I  remember 
that  the  Colosseum  was  where  the  early  Christians 
used  to  be  martyred.  Now  I  got  up  this  morning 
at  half  past  six,  and  therefore  count  myself  among 
the  early  Christians. 

"  I  forgot  to  tell  you  that  George  Curtis  liked 
your  Venetian  poem  very  much.  So  did  I." 

His  position  naturally  made  him  the  recipient 
of  many  commissions  for  securing  the  publication 
of  poems  and  other  manuscripts,  and  his  friendli 
ness  drew  him  into  many  letters  of  counsel,  and  it 
might  be  encouragement.  To  one  whose  acquaint 
ance  he  had  made  through  a  contribution  which 
he  had  accepted  when  editor  of  the  Atlantic,  he 
wrote  in  answer  to  a  letter  in  which  she  had  con 
fessed  to  discouragement  over  hostile  attack  on  a 
more  recent  work :  — 

That  my  note  gave  you  any  pleasure  gives  me 
a  sensible  satisfaction.  I  am  glad  to  find  it  was 
my  Miss after  all. 

You  must  n't  be  disheartened.  If  you  had  writ 
ten  a  foolish  thing,  don't  you  see  ?  —  nobody  would 


130  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

be  attacking  it.  People  don't  bring  artillery  to 
bear  on  soap-bubbles,  but  wait  till  they  burst  of 
themselves.  Don't  allow  yourself  to  be  shaken 
from  that  equipoise  of  good  sense  and  good  tem 
per  that  drew  my  attention  so  strongly  in  your  first 
article.  Above  all,  don't  be  drawn  into  any  con 
troversy.  Keep  straight  on,  as  if  nothing  had 
happened,  and  if  you  have  anything  in  you  be  sure 
the  world  will  find  it  out.  Publicity  is  one  of  the 
painful  necessities  of  authorship.  For  my  own 
part,  I  would  give  all  the  praise  I  ever  received  for 
the  right  to  be  valued  simply  for  my  personal  good 
qualities  alone.  But  you  must  resign  yourself. 
You  have  given  everybody  who  can  command  pen, 
ink,  and  paper  the  right  to  talk  flippantly  and  igno- 
rantly  and  unfeelingly  of  things  into  which  you 
have  put  your  very  heart's  blood.  But  don't  be 
disheartened.  If  you  honestly  try  to  think  (and 
it  was  because  you  seemed  to  me  to  do  so  that  I 
felt  an  interest  in  you)  you  will  come  out  right  in 
the  long  run.  If  you  have  the  true  quality  you 
will  at  last  get  the  power  of  thinking,  the  only 
abiding  satisfaction  and  security  for  happiness 
which  this  life  or  the  other  for  that  matter  affords, 
a  thing  rarer  than  is  generally  supposed.  Really 
to  think  is  to  see  things  as  they  are,  and  when  we 
have  once  got  firm  foot-hold  on  that  rock  of  ages, 
our  own  little  trials  and  triumphs  take  their  true 
proportions,  and  are  as  indifferent  to  us,  morally,  I 
mean,  as  the  changes  of  the  weather.  I  think  you 
have  the  root  of  the  matter  in  you,  that  is,  that 
you  are  in  earnest  to  do  honest  work,  and  not  to 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  131 

flaunt  in  the  newspapers.  For  that  reason  I  wish 
to  help  you  all  I  can.  Don't  think  I  am  writing 
such  letters  as  this  every  week.  On  the  contrary, 
I  am  shy  of  writing  letters  at  all,  especially  to 
women.  But  whenever  a  word  from  me  will  cheer 
you,  you  shall  have  it. 

I  have  directed  two  books  to  be  sent  you  by 
express  and  beg  you  to  accept  them  as  a  token  of 
sincere  esteem  from  your  friend, 

J.  R.  LOWELL. 

There  is  another  letter  drawn  out  from  him  by  a 
stranger  who  was  concerned  over  a  case  of  literary 
honesty,  which  is  interesting  as  showing  how  sen 
sitive  Lowell  was  in  all  matters  pertaining  to  his 
art.  "  You  ask,"  he  writes,  "  my  judgment  on  a 
point  of  literary  morals.  In  the  case  you  set  forth 
I  find  it  hard  to  judge  of  the  facts  without  some 
knowledge  of  the  character  of  the  man,  because 
thoughtlessness,  want  of  moral  sensibility,  and 
loose  habits  of  mind  generally,  may  in  the  partic 
ular  instance  tend  to  lenify  our  judgment  of  the 
ethical  quality  of  the  offence,  without  in  the  least 
changing  our  opinion  of  its  discreditable  nature  as 
respects  good  scholarship  and  honest  literature. 
There  can  be  no  question  that  every  article  (such 
as  you  describe)  should  have  had  the  name  of  its 
true  author  at  the  head  of  it,  so  that  no  man  who 
read  could  fail  to  know  whose  work  he  was  reading. 
Nay,  I  think  we  should  be  so  scrupulous  in  such 
matters  as  to  acknowledge  even  an  apt  quotation 
when  we  owe  it  to  another  man.  For  example,  I 


132  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

suppose  I  must  have  read  the  '  Divinia  Commedia ' 
of  Dante  at  least  thirty  times  with  minute  attention 
and  yet  it  had  never  occurred  to  me  that  cima  di 
giudizie  was  literally  Shakespeare's  phrase, '  top  of 
judgment,'  till  Mr.  Dyce  pointed  it  out  in  a  note 
on  '  Measure  for  Measure.'  I  should  never  think 
of  using  it  as  an  illustration  without  giving  credit 
to  Mr.  Dyce.  Even  had  I  found  the  coincidence 
noted  on  the  margin  of  my  own  copy  of  Dante,  I 
should  still  have  quoted  Dyce  for  it  as  having  first 
mentioned  it  in  print,  in  order  to  avoid  even  the 
appearance  of  evil.  I  think  an  honest  man  can 
easily  resolve  any  doubt  he  may  have  in  such  mat 
ters  by  asking  himself  the  simple  question,  Do  I 
gain  any  credit  that  does  not  belong  to  me  by  let 
ting  it  pass  for  my  own  ?  If  I  do,  it  is  stealing, 
neither  more  nor  less,  for  there  is  no  real  distinc 
tion  between  picking  a  man's  pocket  of  his  money 
and  filching  the  fruits  of  his  industry  or  thought 
from  a  book. 

"  In  literature  proper,  originality  consists  of  such 
an  energy  of  nature  as  enables  a  man  so  to  infuse 
thoughts  or  sentiments  common  to  all  with  his  own 
individuality  as  to  give  them  a  new  character  — 
flavor  would  be  the  better  word  —  commending 
them  anew  to  the  general  palate.  Chaucer  is  a 
capital  instance  in  point.  He  formed  himself 
wholly  on  foreign  models,  helped  himself  to  plots, 
incidents,  and  reflections  from  any  and  everywhere, 
and  yet  is  on  the  whole  fresher  than  almost  any  of 
our  poets.  I  always  liked  him  the  better  for  re 
membering  in  his  '  House  of  Fame  '  the  pipes  of 
those 


POETRY   AND   PROSE  133 

4  little  heardgromes 
That  kepen  bestes  in  the  bromes,' 

for  he  was,  I  doubt  not,  paying  the  debt  he  owed 
to  some  nameless  minstrel. 

"  In  matters  of  research  and  scholarship,  the 
question  seems  to  present  itself  under  a  somewhat 
different  aspect.  All  learning  is  of  necessity  to  a 
great  extent  second-hand  —  but  here  also  there  is 
a  manifest  distinction  between  appropriating  an- 
other  man's  scholarship  and  assimilating  it.  In 
the  one  case  it  lies  a  mere  load  of  indigestible  rub 
bish  upon  the  brain ;  in  the  other,  it  is  dissolved 
and  worked  over  into  a  new  substance,  giving  sus 
tenance  and  impulse  to  one's  native  thought.  So 
that  after  all,  whether  in  literature  or  scholarship, 
the  point  is  not  so  much  what  a  man  has  taken,  as 
whether  he  has  made  something  new  of  what  he 
has  taken.1  If  he  have  not,  then  he  should  make 
punctilious  acknowledgment  of  the  sources  whence 
he  drew.  It  is  one  thing  to  be  indebted  to  a  man 
for  a  hint  that  sets  us  on  a  path  of  original  research 
and  discovery,  and  quite  another  to  rob  him  of  his 
journals  and  publish  them  as  one's  own.  So  as  to 
giving  credit  where  it  is  due  ;  I  would  not  thank 
a  guide-post,  but  I  must  pay  a  guide.  I  may  read 
by  a  man's  lamp,  but  if  I  tap  his  gas  pipe,  I  ought 
to  attach  a  gasometer  that  shall  record  precisely 
how  much  I  borrow. 

"  The  leading  case  in  this  branch  of  literary 
ethics  is  the  famous  one  of  Schelling  et  als.  against 

1  Lowell  amplified  this  thought  in  his  paper  on  Chaucer,  Liter* 
ary  Essays,  iii.  299,  300. 


134  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Coleridge.  For  the  defence  we  should  take  into 
account  the  defendant's  lifelong  habits  of  mental 
dissipation,  his  own  really  great  learning  which 
might  make  him  careless  alike  in  borrowing  and 
lending,  and  above  all  the  effect  of  opium  in  blur 
ring  the  memory  and  deadening  the  nerves  of 
moral  sensation.  On  the  other  hand,  it  would  be 
urged  that  he  lifted  (to  borrow  a  word,  peculiarly 
apt  here,  from  the  loose  dialect  of  the  border)  from 
foreigners  whose  property  would  be  least  liable  to 
identification  by  his  countrymen  ;  he  did  it  by 
translation  and  transfusion,  thus,  as  it  were,  ob 
literating  the  marks  of  former  ownership ;  and 
above  all  (in  the  case  of  A.  W.  Schlegel)  he  did 
it  in  oral  lectures,  thus  driving  his  stolen  cattle  so 
hurriedly  by  in  a  way  to  baffle  detection. 

"  You  will  find  in  Mrs.  Nelson  Coleridge's  Intro 
duction  to  the  4  Biographia  Literaria '  an  eloquent 
and  even  passionate  vindication  of  her  father  from 
the  charge  of  plagiarism.  It  does  her  honor  as  a 
daughter,  but  is  hardly  convincing.  Coleridge's 
acknowledgment  of  general  indebtedness  to  Schel- 
ling  and  others  was,  to  speak  mildly,  wholly  inade 
quate,  and  his  evasions  in  regard  to  Schlegel  leave 
a  very  painful  impression  on  the  mind.  If  he  was 
not  lying,  he  was  so  shamefully  inaccurate  in  dates 
(to  his  own  advantage)  as  to  have  all  the  appear 
ance  of  it. 

"  Now,  your  case  (I  mean  the  one  you  present)  is 
in  many  respects  very  like  this  —  almost  identical 
with  it  indeed.  .  .  . 

"  In  the  old  trials,  one  of  the  questions  on  which 


POETRY  AND  PROSE  135 

the  jury  were  called  on  to  pass  was,  '  Did  he  fly 
for  it?'  That  is,  I  suppose,  'Did  he  give  that 
proof  of  conscious  guilt  ? '  I  should  ask  the  same 
question  in  this  case.  Is  there  any  evidence  of  an 
attempt  at  concealment  ? 

"  But,  abstractedly  from  any  opinion  we  may 
form  of  the  person,  the  action  was  one  altogether 
discreditable  and  contemptible.  We  cannot  be  too 
scrupulous  on  any  point  of  morals  in  a  country 
where  members  of  Congress  see  no  dishonor  in 
selling  appointments  to  the  Army  and  Navy." 

Dr.  Thomas  Hill,  who  was  president  of  Harvard 
in  1868,  asked  Lowell  in  the  summer  of  that  year 
to  look  over  some  papers  he  had  received  from 
Virginia  and  to  give  his  opinion  of  them.  They 
were  the  letters  and  journals  of  a  Virginian  gentle 
man,  Mr.  John  B.  Minor,  who  had  visited  New 
England  in  1834,  and  Lowell  found  them  exceed 
ingly  interesting.  "  Not  the  least  engaging  thing 
in  the  journal,"  he  wrote  to  the  lady  who  had  sent 
the  papers,  "  is  the  character  of  the  author,  every 
where  showing  itself  and  everywhere  amiable.  So 
far  as  he  is  concerned,  the  whole  journal  might  be 
printed  verbatim,  for  there  is  not  an  indiscreet 
word,  much  less  a  breach  of  hospitality,  from  be 
ginning  to  end.  At  the  same  time  there  are,  of 
course,  passages  here  and  there  which  should  be 
omitted  in  printing  —  I  think  not  more  than  two 
or  three  at  most  —  where  he  describes  the  personal 
appearance  of  those  he  met." 

The  next  day  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Fields :  "  There 
has  been  put  into  my  hands  to  dispose  of,  the 


136  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Journal  of  a  Virginia  gentleman  during  a  short 
tour  in  New  England,  partly  on  foot.  The  date  — 
1834,  which  is  now  ages  ago.  There  is  not  a  great 
deal  of  it,  but  I  found  it  truly  entertaining.  I 
think  I  could  make  selections  from  it  that  would 
run  through  four  or  five  numbers  of  the  Atlantic. 
.  .  .  Now,  do  you  want  it  ?  and  if  so,  what  do  you 
think  it  would  be  worth  ?  When  I  say  it  is  enter 
taining,  I  do  not  mean  for  fanatics  like  me,  who 
would  cradle  I  know  not  how  many  tons  of  com 
mon  earth  for  a  grain  of  the  gold  of  human  nature, 
but  for  folks  in  general.  It  is  not  only  interesting 
but  valuable,  and  the  character  of  the  author,  as  it 
blinks  out  continually,  most  engaging.  It  seems 
to  me  remarkable  that  there  is  positively  not  an 
ill-natured  word  from  the  first  page  to  the  last. 
Now  you  know  that  I  have  once  or  twice  pressed 
Sibylline  books  upon  you  which  you  would  n't 
take.  Don't  let  this  one  slip  through  your  fingers. 
I  think  it  might  be  published  afterwards  in  a  small 
volume  with  advantage,  but  of  its  adaptation  to  the 
Atlantic  I  have  no  doubt." 

The  journal  was  printed  in  the  Atlantic  in  the 
summer  and  fall  of  1870,  Lowell  furnishing  an 
introduction  to  the  first  number.  It  was  no  doubt 
under  the  influence  of  this jnew  acquaintance  with  a 
fine  type  of  Southern  manhood,  that  Lowell  wrote 
to  Mr.  Godkin,  20  November,  1868  :  "  I  confess  to 
a  strong  sympathy  with  men  who  sacrificed  every 
thing  even  to  a  bad  cause,  which  they  could  see 
only  the  good  side  of  ;  and  now  the  war  is  over,  I 
see  no  way  to  heal  the  old  wounds  but  by  frankly 


POETRY  AND  PROSE  137 

admitting  this  and  acting  upon  it.  We  can  never 
reconstruct  the  South  except  through  its  own  lead 
ing  men,  nor  ever  hope  to  have  them  on  our  side 
till  we  make  it  for  their  interest  and  compatible 
with  their  honor  to  be  so."  l 

Mr.  and  Mrs.  Fields  were  proposing  to  make  a 
journey  to  Europe  in  the  spring  and  summer  of 
1869,  and  asked  Lowell  to  send  his  daughter  in 
their  company.  Lowell  wrote  in  reply,  19  Janu 
ary,  1869 :  "  I  have  been  thinking  over  your  very 
kind  invitation  to  Mabel,  and,  after  turning  it  in 
every  possible  way,  I  have  come  to  the  conclusion 
that  the  only  way  to  treat  a  generous  offer  is  to  be\ 
generous  enough  to  accept  it.  My  pride  stood  a 
little  in  the  way,  but  my  common  sense  whispered 
me  that  I  had  no  right  to  feed  my  pride  at  my 
daughter's  expense.  And  moreover,  my  dear 
Fields,  you  left  me  a  most  delicate  loophole  for 
my  pride  to  creep  out  of,  in  conferring  on  me  a 
kind  of  militia  generalship  of  the  Atlantic  Monthly 
while  you  were  away.  Now,  if  you  will  let  me 
make  it  something  real,  that  is,  if  you  will  let  me 
read  the  proof-sheets,  I  can  be  of  some  service  in 
preventing (for  example,  merely)  from  writ 
ing  such  awful  English,  and  mayhap  in  some  other 
cases,  as  a  consulting  physician.  Moreover,  I 
should  like  to  translate  for  Every  Saturday  some- 

1  Letters,  ii.  5.  There  was  a  reciprocity  of  feeling-,  if  we  may 
judge  from  the  striking*  fact  that  on  the  right,  within  the  gate 
which  leads  to  the  impressive  common  tomb  of  the  Army  of 
Tennessee,  in  New  Orleans,  is  an  inscription  taken  from  Lowell's 
poem,  "  On  the  Capture  of  Fugitive  Slaves  near  Washington." 
"  Before  Man  made  us  citizens,  great  Nature  made  us  men." 


138  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

thing  now  and  then,  as,  for  instance,  the  article  on 
Deak  and  the  dramatic  sketch  of  Octave  Feuillet, 
lately  published  in  the  Revue  de  Deux  Mondes. 
May  I?" 

While  his  daughter  was  travelling  with  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Fields,  Lowell  wrote  to  Mr.  Fields  a  piece  of 
news  anticipative  of  what  came  to  an  event  a  little 
less  than  ten  years  later  :  "  Mabel's  letters  overrun 
with  happiness,  which  I  fully  share  in  reading 
them.  I  wrote  her  a  long  letter  about  nothing 
yesterday  —  but  I  did  not  tell  her  what  you  may 
(as  a  secret  for  you  three),  that  I  came  very  near 
being  sent  to  Spain,  and  that  in  case  the  Senate 
should  not  confirm  Sickles  in  December,  the  chances 
for  me  are  the  best.  Judge  Hoar  told  me  when  he 
was  here  the  other  day,  that  Mr.  Fish  was  friendly, 
and  that  the  Assistant  Secretary  was  '  zealous  even 
unto  slaying,'  as  he  was  himself.  So  who  knows 
but  my  name  may  get  into  capitals  in  the  triennial 
catalogues  yet  ?  That,  after  all,  is  the  main  thing 
—  for  is  it  not  a  kind  of  fame  as  good  as  the  next  ? 
For  my  own  part,  I  can  conceive  of  no  place  better 
to  live  or  die  in  than  where  I  was  born. 

"  I  hope  Mabel  makes  a  jolly  companion.  She 
always  does  for  me.1  If  she  is  as  happy  as  her  let 
ters  show  her,  I  think  she  must.  Tell  her  I  should 
have  told  her  about  Spain  —  but  I  forgot  it.  I 
shall  have  my  choice  of  castles  to  live  in,  if  I  go 
there,  of  my  own  building." 

"  For  awhile  last  spring,"  he  wrote  in  December 

1  Perhaps  it  was  on  this  journey  that  she  told  Mrs.  Fields  she 
never  thought  of  her  father  as  a  poet,  but  just  her  father. 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  139 

to  Mr.  Norton,  "  I  thought  it  possible  I  might  be 
sent  abroad.  Hoar  was  strenuous  for  it,  and  I 
should  have  been  very  glad  of  it  then.  .  .  .  How 
ever,  it  all  fell  through,  and  I  am  glad  it  did,  for 
I  should  not  have  written  my  new  poem."  l  The 
new  poem  was  "  The  Cathedral  "  which  was  issued 
in  book  form  at  Christmas,  1869,  as  well  as  in  the 
Atlantic  for  January,  1870.  He  wrote  it  during 
the  summer  vacation  and  took  great  pleasure  in  the 
writing.  He  had  told  Mr.  Howells  what  he  was 
about,  and  on  being  asked  for  the  poem  for  the 
Atlantic  replied :  "  Up  to  time,  indeed !  the  fear 
is  not  about  time,  but  space.  You  won't  have 
room  in  your  menagerie  for  such  a  displeaseyou- 
saurus.  The  verses,  if  stretched  end  to  end  in  a 
continuous  line,  would  go  clear  round  the  Cathe 
dral  they  celebrate,  and  nobody  (I  fear)  the  wiser. 
I  can't  tell  yet  what  they  are.  There  seems  a 
bit  of  clean  carving  here  and  there,  a  solid  but 
tress  or  two,  and  perhaps  a  gleam  through  painted 
glass  —  but  I  have  not  copied  it  out  yet,  nor  in 
deed  read  it  over  consecutively."  2  A  little  later 
he  could  write  to  Miss  Norton :  "  The  poem  turned 
out  to  be  something  immense,  as  the  slang  is  now 
adays,  that  is,  it  ran  on  to  eight  hundred  lines 
of  blank  verse.  I  hope  it  is  good,  for  it  fairly 
trussed  me  at  last  and  bore  me  up  as  high  as  my 
poor  lungs  will  bear  into  the  heaven  of  invention. 
I  was  happy  writing  it,  and  so  steeped  in  it  that  if 
I  had  written  to  you  it  would  have  been  in  blank 
verse.  It  is  a  kind  of  religious  poem,  and  is 
1  Letters,  ii.  52.  2  Letters,  ii.  35. 


140  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

called  l  A  Day  at  Chartres,'  " l  He  dedicated  the 
poem  with  special  pleasure  to  Mr.  Fields,  who  by 
the  bye  had  persuaded  him  to  substitute  the  name 
used  for  that  he  had  chosen,  a  change  which  Low 
ell  regretted  in  writing  to  Mr.  Stephen,  as  depriv 
ing  the  poem  of  certain  definite,  local,  and  histori- 
j  cal  justification.  "  The  Cathedral "  drew  from 
Mr.  Ruskin  warm  praise.  "  The  main  substance 
of  the  poem  is  most  precious  to  me,"  he  wrote, 
"  and  its  separate  lines  sometimes  unbetterable," 
and  he  added  some  specific  criticism  on  words, 
which  Lowell  met  with  more  of  his  favorite  in 
stances  of  long-lived  words  brought  over  in  the 
mental  baggage  of  the  early  New  England  set 
tlers.  The  letter  in  which  he  conclusively  justifies 
himself  is  an  excellent  example  of  the  reasoning 
of  a  philologist  to  whom  words  are  alive,  and  not 
specimens  in  a  museum.2 

A  correspondent  had  enquired  in  behalf  of  a 
friend,  as  had  Ruskin,  for  his  authority  in  using 
"  decuman  "  in  the  line 

"  Spume-sliding  down  the  baffled  decuman," 

and  he  replied :  "  My  friendly  catechist  has  cer 
tainly  put  in  a  fair  claim  to  a  speedy  answer. 
Whence  that  word  '  decuman '  got  into  my  memory 
I  have  no  notion.  It  seems  to  have  got  embedded 
there  during  my  eocene  period,  and  hopped  out 
lively  as  one  of  those  toads  we  have  all  heard  of 
the  moment  it  got  a  chance.  And  the  likeness 

1  letters,  ii.  38. 

2  See  Letters,  ii.  64-67.    Also  the  Cambridge  edition  of  Lowell's 
poems,  p.  479. 


POETRY  AND  PROSE  141 

was  the  nearer  that  it  had  'a  precious  jewel  in 
its  head.'  In  short,  the  word  was  there  —  it  was 
canorous,  and  it  expressed  just  what  I  meant.  So 
I  used  it  unsuspiciously.  I  did  not  mean  to  make 
a  conundrum  —  I  never  do,  but  I  had  made  one. 
When  I  was  asked  for  the  solution,  the  answer 
was  ready  enough  — i  the  tenth  wave,'  which  was 
thought  higher  than  the  rest.  But  when  I  was 
asked  for  my  authority !  I  thought  I  had  met  with 
it  in  Ovid.  No !  In  Lucan.  No !  They  both 
speak  of  the  tenth  wave,  but  not  in  that  absolute 
way.  I  looked  in  my  dictionaries.  I  found  it  at 
last  in  Forcellini.  Then  I  went  to  my  Ducange, 
and  the  authority  cited  was  one  of  the  Latin  Fa 
thers,  I  forget  which.  However,  there  it  was,  and 
with  the  meaning  I  had  remembered." 

Although  the  title,  "  A  Day  at  Chartres,"  carries 
with  it  a  notion  of  less  formality,  and  has  a  pictur 
esque  quality,  there  is  a  fitness  in  the  soberer  title 
that  permits  the  mind  to  play  with  the  theme. 
For  Lowell  here"  builds  upon  the  foundation  of 
human  life  a  fane  for  worship,  and  in  the  specula 
tions  which  discriminate  between  the  conventional 
and  the  free  aspirations  of  the  soul,  constructs  out 
of  living  stones  a  house  of  prayer.  Nor  is  there 
absent  that  capricious  mood  which  carved  gro 
tesques  upon  the  under  side  of  the  benches  at 
which  the  worshippers  kneeled,  so  that  when  the 
reader,  borne  along  by  the  high  thought,  stumbles 
over  such  lines  as 

"  Who,  meeting-  Caesar's  self,  would  slap  his  back, 
Call  him  '  Old  Horse  '  and  challenge  to  a  drink," 


142  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

he  may,  if  he  will,  console  himself  with  the  reflec 
tion  that  the  most  aspiring  Gothic  carries  like 
grimacing  touches  within  its  majestic  walls. 

"  Imagination's  very  self  in  stone." 

That  is  the  epithet  Lowell  bestows  on  Chartres 
Cathedral,  and  in  the  few  spirited  lines  in  which 
he  contrasts  the  Greek  with  the  Goth,  and  hints 
at  the  historic  evolution  of  the  latter,  he  is  in  a 
large  way  reflecting  the  native  constitution  o£  his 
own  mind, 

V  "  Still  climbing,  luring  fancy  still  to  climb." 

In  the  letters  which  Lowell  wrote  when  "The 
Cathedral "  was  stirring  his  mind  one  sees  most 
impressively  the  struggle  which  was  always  more 
or  less  racking  him  of  an  unfulfilled  poetic  power. 
The  very  spontaneity  of  his  nature  was  in  a  way 
an  obstacle  to  expression.  He  waited  for  the  wa- 
ters  to  be  troubled,  he  was  critical  of  his  moods, 
of  his  opportunities,  and  when  the  moment  was 
seized,  if  he  could  indeed  hold  it,  he  was  supremely 
happy.  "  How  happy  I  was  while  I  was  writing 
it,"  he  says  just  as  the  poem  is  to  be  published ; 
"  for  weeks  it  and  I  were  alone  in  the  world  till 
Fanny  well-nigh  grew  jealous."  And  yet  in  the 
very  memory  of  this  bliss  he  is  haunted  by  the 
thought  of  that  black  care  which  rides  behind. 
"  You  don't  know,  my  dear  Charles,  what  it  is  to 
have  sordid  cares,  to  be  shivering  on  the  steep 
edge  of  your  bank-book,  beyond  which  lies  debt. 
I  am  willing  to  say  it  to  you,  because  I  know  I 
should  have  written  more  and  better.  They  say  it 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  143 

is  good  to  be  obliged  to  do  what  we  don't  like,  but 
I  am  sure  it  is  not  good  for  me  —  it  wastes  so 
much  time  in  the  mere  forethought  of  what  you 
are  to  do."  The  matter  was  not  made  easier  by 
the  pride  and  honorable  resolve  not  to  mortgage 
the  future  for  the  sake  of  some  present  indulgence. 
Lowell  went  without  things  he  wanted  rather  than 
get  into  debt  for  them,  and  though  he  chafed  under 
the  conditions  which  compelled  him  to  the  doing  of 
irksome  tasks,  he  would  borrow  no  short-lived  ease. 
In  making  up  an  account  with  Mr.  Fields  at  the 
close  of  1869,  when  he  found  himself  on  the  wrong 
side  of  the  ledger,  he  wrote :  "  You  must  allow  me 
also  to  clear  off  the  rest  ...  as  soon  as  I  can. 
There  is  no  earthly  reason  why  I  should  n't,  and 
a  great  many  why  I  should.  I  hate  any  kind  of 
money  obligations  between  friends.  When  I  have 
paid  this  off,  the  kindness  will  be  left,  and  the  ob 
ligation  gone.  I  shall  be  able  to  manage  it  before 
long.  I  never  could  see  any  reason  why  poets 
should  claim  immunity  beyond  other  folks.  It  is 
not  wholesome  for  them."  Even  in  petty  matters 
he  disliked  exceedingly  to  be  under  pecuniary  obli 
gation.  His  letters  to  Mr.  Godkin,  as  printed  by 
Mr.  Norton,  show  an  unconquerable  aversion  to 
being  a  "  deadhead  "  under  any  circumstances,  and 
I  remember  once,  when  I  went  with  him  to  the 
Museum  of  Fine  Arts  for  some  special  exhibition, 
his  annoyance  at  finding  it  was  a  free  day  and  he 
could  not  pay  the  ordinary  toll. 

His  prose  work,  in  1869,  included  his  papers  on 
Chaucer  and  Pope,  and  his  "  Good  Word  for  Win- 


144  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

ter,"  and  at  the  end  of  the  year  he  issued  a  selec 
tion  from  what  he  had  already  written,  in  the  first 
series  of  "Among  My  Books."  But  his  slowly 
growing  collection  of  published  writings  did  not 
add  materially  to  his  income,  and  he  continued  to 
be  embarrassed  by  the  poverty  of  a  landholder 
who  had  heavy  taxes  to  pay  and  only  the  meagrest 
return  from  the  productive  part  of  his  estate.  The 
only  relief  he  could  foresee  was  in  the  possible  sale 
of  some  of  his  land. 

The  point  to  be  noted,  however,  is  that  with  all 
this  pressure  of  need,  Lowell  knew  himself  so  well 
that  he  would  not,  even  when  a  golden  bait  was 
dangled  before  him,  accept  invitations  to  write 
which  required  of  him  the  diligence  and  the  punc 
tuality  of  the  hack  workman.  No.  He  would 
attend  to  his  college  duties,  do  what  he  could  for 
the  North  American,  and  accept  the  occasional 
opportunity  which  offered  for  reading  a  lecture. 
He  honored  his  art,  and  he  refused  to  make  it  a 
perfunctory  task.  His  old  friend  Robert  Carter 
was  now  editor  of  Appleton's  Journal,  and  very 
naturally  sought  contributions  from  Lowell,  but 
Lowell  replied  in  a  letter  written  11  March,  1870 : 

"  Many  thanks  for  your  Journal,  which  I  have 
looked  through  with  a  great  deal  of  pleasure,  and 
which  I  should  think  likely  to  do  good  in  raising 
the  public  taste. 

"  I  am  much  obliged  to  you  also  for  your  pro 
posal,  though  I  cannot  accept  it.  I  have  not  time. 
I  have  not  that  happy  gift  of  inspired  knowledge 
so  common  in  this  country,  and  work  more  and 


POETRY   AND   PROSE  145 

more  slowly  toward  conclusions  as  I  get  older.  I 
give  on  an  average  twelve  hours  a  day  to  study 
(after  my  own  fashion),  but  I  find  real  knowledge 
slow  of  accumulation.  Moreover,  I  shall  be  too 
busy  in  the  college  for  a  year  or  two  yet.  It  is 
not  the  career  I  should  have  chosen,  and  I  half 
think  I  was  made  for  better  things  —  but  I  must 
make  the  best  of  it.  Between  ourselves,  I  de 
clined  lately  an  offer  of  $4000  a  year  from 

to  write  four  pages  monthly  in . 

"It  takes  me  a  good  while  to  be  sure  I  am 
right.  A  five  or  six  page  notice  in  the  next 
N.  A.  R.1  will  have  cost  me  a  fortnight's  work  of  a 
microscopic  kind.  My  pay  must  be  in  a  sense  of 
honest  thoroughness." 

Lowell  lectured  in  the  spring  of  1870  at  Balti 
more,  and  before  the  students  of  Cornell  Univer 
sity.  In  the  summer  he  enjoyed  much  making 
the  personal  acquaintance  of  Thomas.  Hughes,  who 
visited  America  at  this  time.  Lowell  had  known 
him  by  correspondence,  and  Hughes,  who  was  an 
ardent  admirer  of  Lowell  and  had  introduced  the 
"  Biglow  Papers "  to  the  English  public,  some 
what  embarrassed  the  author  of  those  poems  by 
quoting  from  them  on  all  occasions.  For  his  work 
he  gave  himself  to  the  reading  of  old  French 
metrical  romances,  but  the  year  saw  scarcely  any 
product,  though  at  its  close  he  brought  together 
a  group  of  indoor  and  outdoor  studies  under  the 
title  of  "  My  Study  Windows."  "  I  long  to  give 
myself  to  poetry  again,"  he  writes  in  October  to 

1  On  Goodwin's  Plutarch's  Morals. 


146  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Miss  Norton,  "  before  I  am  so  old  that  I  have  only 
thought  and  no  music  left.  I  can't  say  as  Milton 
did, fc  I  am  growing  my  wings.' ''  There  is  a  phrase 
noting  a  curious  consciousness  he  had  at  this  time 
in  a  letter  to  Mr.  Norton,  written  15  October, 
1870 :  "  I  wrote  Jane  yesterday  a  kind  of  letter, 
but  you  must  wait  till  my  ships  come  in  before  I 
can  write  the  real  thing.  I  can't  get  rid  of  myself 
enough  when  I  am  worried  as  I  am  a  good  part  of 
the  time.  It  is  curious,  when  I  am  in  company  I 
watch  myself  as  if  I  were  a  third  person,  and  hear 
the  sound  of  my  own  voice,  which  I  never  do  in  a 
natural  mood.  However,  I  shall  come  out  of  it  all 
in  good  time." 

His  old  correspondent,  Mr.  Eichard  Grant 
White,  published  this  year  his  "  Words  and  their 
Uses,"  and  wrote  to  Lowell,  asking  permission  to 
dedicate  the  book  to  him.  Lowell  replied :  — 

ELMWOOD,  2  August,  1870. 

MY  DEAR  SIR, —  In  the  midst  of  my  sallow 
grass  and  my  leaves  crumpled  with  drought,  a  lit 
tle  spring  seemed  to  bubble  up  at  my  feet  in  your 
letter.  How  could  I  feel  other  than  pleased  and 
honored  with  your  proposal  ?  I  wish  only  I  de 
served  it  better  —  but  anyhow  I  can't  find  it  in  my 
heart  to  wave  aside  my  crown  out  of  modesty,  lest 
Anthony  might  not  offer  it  again.  So  I  put  it  on 
my  head  with  many  thanks,  consoled  with  the 
reflection  that  a  wreath  unmerited  always  avenges 
itself  by  looking  confoundedly  like  a  foolscap  in 
the  eyes  of  every  one  but  the  wearer.  So  I  bow 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  147 

my  head  meekly  to  your  laurels,  and  thank  you 
very  heartily  for  an  honor  as  agreeable  as  it  is 
unexpected.  I  shall  have  the  satisfaction  of  know 
ing  that  the  deserved  popularity  of  your  book  will 
carry  my  name  into  many  a  pleasant  home  where 
it  is  now  unfamiliar,  and  if  my  publisher's  ac 
counts  show  a  better  figure  hereafter,  I  shall  say  it 
is  your  doing. 

With  a  very  sincere  acknowledgment  of  the 
obligation  you  lay  upon  me  to  do  some  credit  to 
your  second  leaf, 

I  remain,  my  dear  Sir, 

Very  cordially  yours, 
J.  R.  LOWELL. 

RICHARD  GRANT  WHITE,  ESQ. 

After  some  delays  attendant  on  such  business, 
Lowell  was  able  in  the  summer  of  1871  to  make 
a  sale  of  a  portion  of  the  original  estate  of  Elm- 
wood  which  left  him  the  house  and  a  couple  of 
acres  for  his  home,  and  an  income  of  four  or  five 
thousand  dollars  a  year.  It  was  a  modest  living, 
but  it  cleared  his  mind  of  fretting  cares.  As  he 
wrote  to  Mr.  Stephen  :  "  It  is  a  life-preserver  that 
will  keep  my  head  above  water,  and  the  swimming 
I  will  do  for  myself."  Of  the  effect  upon  his  mind 
he  wrote  more  freely  to  his  friend  Mr.  Norton  : 
"  I  Cannot  tell  you  how  this  sense  of  my  regained 
paradise  of  Independence  enlivens  me.  It  is  some 
thing  I  have  not  felt  for  years  —  hardly  since  I 
have  been  a  professor.  The  constant  sense  of  a 
ball  and  chain  jangling  at  my  heels,  and  that  those 
who  are  inexpressibly  dear  to  me  were  at  the  risk 


148  JAMES  RUSSELL   LOWELL 

of  my  giving  satisfaction  in  an  office  where  what 
is  best  in  me  was  too  often  held  in  abeyance  by  an 
uneasy  self-consciousness  forced  upon  me  by  my 
position,  have  been  greater  hindrances  than  any 
body  else  can  ever  know.  But  now  I  can  draw  a 
full  breath  of  natural  air  and  discarbonate  my 
lungs  of  the  heavy  atmosphere  of  an  unnatural 
confinement.  I  look  forward  to  my  next  year's 
work  with  cheerfulness.  I  am  no  longer  chained 
to  the  oar,  but  a  volunteer.  Whether  I  shall 
recover  the  wholesome  mental  unrest  which  kept 
me  active  when  I  was  younger,  I  know  not,  but  at 
least  I  shan't  have  to  print  before  I  am  ready,  nor 
to  keep  on  with  the  spendthrift  habit  of  splitting 
up  the  furniture  of  my  brain  to  keep  the  pot  boil 
ing.  ...  I  mean  to  come  abroad  at  the  end  of  the 
next  college  year,  and  shall  pop  in  on  you  some 
day,  bringing  a  familiar  odor,  half  Cambridge,  half 
pipe.  I  shall  read  you  my  new  poem  —  when  it 
gets  written  —  and  bore  you  with  old  French  in 
which  I  am  still  plunged  to  the  ears.  I  am  be 
come  a  pretty  thorough  master  of  it,  and  wish  I 
knew  the  modern  lingo  half  as  well." 

"  It  takes  a  good  while,"  he  writes  to  Miss  Nor 
ton,  "  to  slough  off  the  effect  of  seventeen  years  of 
pedagogy.  I  am  grown  learned  (after  a  fashion) 
and  dull.  The  lead  has  entered  into  my  soul.  But 
I  have  great  faith  in  putting  the  sea  between  me 
and  the  stocks  I  have  been  sitting  in  so  long." 
He  worked  steadily  at  his  college  duties,  with 
some  thought,  I  suspect,  of  finishing  with  his  pro 
fessorial  work,  the  laboriously  learned  part  of  his 


POETRY  AND   PROSE  149 

life.  The  minute,  painstaking  care  to  which  he 
gave  to  the  studies  which  underlay  his  college  work, 
so  evident  in  the  annotation  of  his  books,  was  after 
all  a  severe  drain  upon  a  nature  that  took  the 
greatest  delight  in  imaginative  freedom.  He  seems 
hardly  to  have  allowed  himself  any  relief.  "  I  have 
been  reading  over  your  book l  again,"  he  writes  to 
Mr.  Fields,  29  February,  1872,  "  and  found  it  very 
interesting  and  queer.  Queer,  I  say,  because  it  is 
the  first  volume  I  have  read  for  some  months  later 
than  the  XIV.  century,  and  I  was  a  little  puzzled 
at  first,  like  Selkirk  when  he  got  back  among  his 
own  people  and  heard  his  own  language  again.  I 
am  glad  you  have  left  out  the  imaginary  nephew. 
One  was  apt  to  stumble  over  him  and  apologize 
with  a  4  Beg  pardon,  but  really  had  forgotten 
you  were  here.'  These  buffers  between  the  reader 
and  the  first  personal  pronoun  never  lessen  the 
shock,  though  they  are  always  in  the  way.  But 
nobody  wants  them,  for  egotism  does  not  consist  in 
never  so  many  capital  7's.  Moreover,  I  am  per 
suaded  that  everybody  likes  it  in  his  secret  heart 
(as  he  does  garlic),  and  says  he  does  n't  for  ap 
pearances. 

"Your  Dickens  letters  are  a  great  deal  more 
interesting  than  Forster's  for  some  reason  or  other. 
I  fancy  it  is  because  they  are  more  natural.  In 
writing  to  Forster,  Dickens  must  have  felt  that 
he  was  writing  to  his  biographer,  and  had  the  con 
straint  of  sitting  before  a  glass.  Indeed,  I  was 

1  Yesterdays  with  Authors,  published  first  in  the  Atlantic,  where 
Lowell  also  read  it,  as  "  Our  Whispering  Gallery." 


150  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

very  much  disappointed  in  Forster's  volume.1  It 
does  n't  leave  an  agreeable  impression,  which  is 
•surely  a  fault  in  biography. 

"  What  a  dear  old  affectionate  soul  Miss  Mitford 
was  !  I  knew  nothing  about  her  before.  Even 
her  little  vanities  are  rather  pleasant  than  other 
wise.  It  is  surely  a  delightful  gift  to  be  made 
happy  as  easily  as  she. 

44  We  are  all  busy  getting  ready  for  Mabel's  de 
parture.  I  hate  to  think  of  it,  though  I  believe 
she  is  as  safe  as  human  forethought  could  make 
her.  Burnett  is  all  I  could  wish." 

Miss  Lowell  was  married  2  April,  1872,  to  Mr. 
Edward  Burnett,  and  went  with  him  to  Southboro, 
Massachusetts,  where  he  was  carrying  on  a  dairy 
and  stock  farm.  Miss  Rebecca  Lowell  died  in 
May,  so  that  the  household  at  Elmwood  was  in  a 
measure  dissolved.  Lowell  was  busy  up  to  the  last 
over  the  long  article  on  Dante  which  he  contrib 
uted  to  the  July  North  American.  He  was  re 
leased  from  his  college  work,  having  resigned  his 
professorship ;  he  let  Elmwood  to  Mr.  Aldrich  and 
sailed  9  July  for  Europe  with  Mrs.  Lowell,  to  be, 
absent  two  years. 

1  The  first  volume  of  Forster's  Dickens  was  published  in  ad 
vance  of  the  others. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THIKD   JOURNEY   IN   EUROPE 
1872-1874 

WHEN  Lowell  went  to  Europe  in  the  summer 
of  1872,  he  left  his  college  routine  behind  him  ; 
with  his  new-found  liberty,  he  seemed  to  find  all 
the  expression  he  cared  for  in  familiar  talk  with 
the  many  friends,  old  and  new,  whom  he  en 
countered  in  his  travels,  and  in  letters  to  friends 
at  home  and  abroad.  Once  only,  as  will  be  seen, 
did  he  break  into  poetry,  but  the  two  years  of  his 
absence  contain  so  little  to  add  to  the  record  of  his 
production  that  it  seems  the  natural  course,  as  it 
is  most  pleasant  to  the  biographer,  to  let  this  holi 
day  in  Lowell's  life  be  told  for  the  most  part  in 
his  letters.  The  letters  printed  by  Mr.  Norton  l 
are  not  drawn  upon,  except  now  and  then  for  a 
needful  phrase. 

To  Thomas  Hughes. 

ROYAL  VICTORIA  HOTEL,  KILLARNEY, 

20  July,  1872. 

MY  DEAR  HUGHES,  • —  Finding  I  could  land  in 
Queenstown,  I  did  so  with  most  infinite  discom 
fort,  and  here  I  am  in  Ireland,  having  on  my  way 

1  Letters,  ii.  pp.  81-128. 


152  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

hither  done  Blarney  Castle  which  is  well-nigh  as 
good  as  Kenilworth.  Here,  to  my  surprise,  I  find 
a  gigantic  new  K.  C.  Cathedral,  See  of  the  Bishop 
of  Kerry.  However,  I  am  not  writing  a  guide 
book.  I  wish  to  ask  if  you  are  in  London,  and 
how  long  you  will  remain.  I  am  of  two  rninds,  — 
one  to  go  straight  to  the  Continent,  the  other  to 
stay  a  week  or  two  in  London  in  lodgings  and  see 
things  quietly  in  that  blessed  season  when  every 
body  is  out  of  town.  You  I  "  lot "  upon  seeing. 
Will  you  write  me  at  the  Grosvenor  Hotel,  Ches 
ter  (where  I  shall  turn  up  by  and  by),  and  let  me 
know?  I  am  not  even  sure  if  Parliament  have 
adjourned.  Think  of  it !  Just  like  our  Yankee 
impudence,  is  n't  it  ?  But  the  truth  is,  the  last 
paper  I  saw  was  dated  9th  July,  and  I  hate  to 
make  acquaintance  again  with  the  World  and  its 
goings-on. 

I  must  run  to  my  breakfast,  or  rather  to  Ma 
dame,  of  whom  I  have  visions  wandering  discon 
solate  in  search  of  me  who  am  ensconced  in  the 
smoking-room,  where  I  happened  to  see  an  ink 
stand  last  night. 

In  the  hope  of  seeing  you  soon, 

Affectionately  yours  always, 

J.  K.  LOWELL. 

To  the  Same. 

CHESTER,  28  July,  1872. 

Your  letter  and  I  arrived  here  together  last 
night.  We  shall  stay  here  three  or  four  days  to 
recruit  from  the  Irish  accent,  —  which  somehow 
wearied  me  wonderfully. 


THIRD  JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  153 

If  lodgings  may  be  had  by  the  week,  to  renew 
or  no  at  will,  you  would  greatly  oblige  me  by 
taking  plain  and  inexpensive  ones  for  us,  where  I 
can  let  my  cup  fill  again  from  a  tap  that  rather 
dribbles  than  runs.  Travelling,  I  find,  drains.  A 
pleasant  landlady  I  should  prefer  to  splendor.  I 
get  more  than  enough  of  that  in  the  hotels.  .  .  . 

If  you  should  find  lodgings,  I  will  engage  them, 
beginning  with  Friday  next.  If  I  once  get  a  perch 
to  which  I  can  return  at  need,  I  can  take  short 
flights  wherever  I  will,  without  such  heaps  of  lug 
gage.  Will  you  telegraph  or  write  me  here  ?  If 
no  lodgings,  tell  me  of  some  quiet  hotel,  —  not 
on  the  American  caravanserai  system,  whither  we 
can  go. 

To  Miss  Grace  Norton. 

11  DOVER  STREET,  PICCADILLY, 
Aug.  4,  1872. 

.  .  .  Dublin  interested  me  much.  .  .  .  From 
Dublin  to  Chester,  where  we  stayed  five  days,  and 
where  Charles  Kingsley  (who  is  a  canon  there) 
was  very  kind.  We  had  the  advantage  of  going 
over  the  Cathedral  with  him,  and  over  the  town 
with  the  chief  local  antiquary.  We  fell  quite  in 
love,  with  it  and  with  the  delightful  walk  round 
the  walls.  We  arrived  in  London  night  before 
last.  Affectionately  yours, 

LLUMBAGO  LLOWELL. 


154  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

To  C.  E.  Norton. 

11  DOVER  STREET,  PICCADILLY, 
13  August,  1872. 

Give  my  love  to  Grace  and  relieve  the  anxiety 
of  her  mind  by  telling  her  I  have  found  J.  H.  at 
the  Tavistock  Hotel,  Covent  Garden,  where  he  is 
Mr.  'Omes.  I  have  tried  in  vain  to  get  him  up 
hither.  He  goes  to  Dresden  on  Thursday  to  meet 
some  friends  whom  he  learned  to  know  at  the  Fos 
ters'  and  whom  he  likes.  Then  he  is  coming  round 
slowly  to  Paris,  where  we  are  to  meet  and  decide 
on  plans.  Meanwhile  I  have  resolved  to  stay  here 
till  you  come,  if  you  come  soon,  enough.1  If  not, 
I  shall  cross  over  to  you.  I  go  down  to  Yorkshire 
(I  mean  Cumberland)  on  Friday  or  Saturday  to 
see  the  Storys.  I  can  show  Fanny  York,  Durham, 
and  Fountain's  Abbey  on  the  way,  —  and  Ripon, 
though  I  did  not  think  it  much  twenty  years  ago. 
We  shall  spend  a  few  days  with  the  Storys  at 
"  Crosby  Lodge  on  Eden  "  (which  has  a  pleasant 
name,  as  if  it  stood  in  a  garden  of  cucumbers),  and 
then  work  downward  through  the  Lake  Country 
and  so  back  to  London.  We  have  very  central 
lodgings  here,  with  what  I  value  above  all,  a  plea 
sant  landlady.  Our  rooms  are  very  small,  but 
they  can  be  smoked  in,  being  bachelor  apartments 
construed  into  the  dual.  As  it  is  not  the  season, 
we  shall  probably  have  no  trouble  in  getting  them 
again  when  we  come  back.  Now  if  you  are  coming 

1  Mr.  Norton  with  his  family  was  at  St.  Germain,  near  Paris. 


THIRD  JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  155 

over  early  in  September,  you  see  it  would  be  better 
for  us  to  stay  till  you  come. 

We  have  been  having  a  very  pleasant  time  thus 
far,  though  I  have  not  yet  quite  got  over  the  feel 
ing  of  the  ball  and  chain.  It  will  take  a  good 
while.  I  do  not  know  whether  I  told  you  I  had 
resigned  my  professorship  ?  I  did  so  the  night 
before  we  sailed  that  there  might  be  no  discussion. 
I  found  that  at  any  rate  my  salary  ceased  during 
my  absence,  and  so  I  thought  it  a  good  chance.  I 
do  not  altogether  like  this  matter  of  the  salary. 
It  prevents  any  professor  who  has  not  some  private 
fortune  of  his  own  from  having  any  vacation  at 
all.1  But  I  am  glad  it  happened  so,  for  it  just 
turned  the  scale  with  me  in  favor  of  the  wiser 
decision,  —  as  I  think  it  is.  I  cannot  yet  get  over 
the  dulness  it  ground  into  me.  I  begin  to  think  I 
am  too  old  ever  to  shake  it  wholly  off.  .  .  . 

We  have  been  seeing  all  sorts  of  things  (persons 
are  out  of  town)  since  we  have  been  here.  The 
Hogarths  delight  me  again,  and  I  have  twice  seen 
the  Rake's  Progress,  which  I  did  not  get  at  when  I 
was  here  before.  Hogarth's  color  is  as  fine  as  his 
invention  and  dramatic  powers.  He  astonishes  me 
always  by  his  soft  brilliancy  and  harmony.  I  have 
lots  of  things  to  talk  over  when  we  meet. 

1  The  diffictilty  has  since  been  obviated  by  the  system  of  jab- 
batical  years  at  Harvard,  with  half  salary. 


156  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

To  the  Same. 

11  DOVER  STREET,  PICCADILLY, 
15  September,  1872. 

Here  we  are  back  again  in  our  old  lodgings,  with 
the  nicest  of  possible  landladies,  Mrs.  Bennett. 
We  spent  ten  days  with  the  Storys  at  Crosby . 
Lodge,  and  while  there  went  to  Naworth  and  Cor 
bie  Castles  and  Lanercost  Abbey.  Naworth  in 
terested  me  specially  as  being  an  old  border 
keep  tamed  to  modern  civilities,  and  I  liked  the 
Howards,  father  and  son,  more  even  than  their 
dwelling.  On  our  way  north  we  saw  Peterboro, 
Lincoln,  York,  Fountain's  Abbey,  Bipon,  Durham, 
and  Carlisle.  My  old  impression  was  confirmed, 
and  Durham  lords  it  over  all  of  them  in  my  mem 
ory.  Again,  also,  as  twenty  years  ago,  the  Cum 
berland  people  seemed  more  American  in  look  and 
manner  than  other  English  folk.  Our  visit  with 
the  Storys  was  very  pleasant  —  for  a  friendship  of 
forty  years'  standing  is  no  common  thing  —  and 
William  is  absolutely  unchanged.  I  found  that  I 
had  grown  away  from  him  somewhat,  but  not  in  a 
way  to  lessen  our  cordiality,  and  as  always,  in  such 
cases,  I  held  my  tongue  on  controversial  points. 

From  Cumberland  we  went  right  through  to 
Grasmere,  lodging  at  the  old  Swan  Inn  (the  only 
one  left),  which  pleased  me  more  than  it  did 
Fanny.  We  drove  to  Dungeon  Ghyll  Force  and 
Keswick,  and  then  to  Lichfield.  Here  I  had  a 
most  amusing  evening  in  the  smoking-room,  listen 
ing  to  the  talk  of  the  city  magnates,  full  of  Philis- 


THIRD  JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  157 

terei,  if  you  will,  but  with  a  full  Shakespearian 
flavor  and  a  basis  of  English  good  sense  that 
pleased  me.  From  Lichfield  through  Worcester 
to  Hereford  and  thence  to  Gloucester,  whose  cathe 
dral  I  liked  best  on  the  whole,  its  centre  tower 
being  less  squat  than  the  others.  But  the  north 
ern  minsters  beat  'em. 

Thence  to  Tintern,  where  we  spent  four  days, 
doing  Ragland  meanwhile.  From  Tintern  to 
Chepstow  we  took  boat  down  the  Wye,  and  very 
delightful  it  was.  Thence  to  Bristol,  where  we 
slept,  saw  St.  Mary  Radcliffe  and  the  cathedral, 
and  then  through  to  London.  The  sight  of  masts 
at  Bristol  was  a  cordial  to  me,  and  I  thought  them 
the  finest  trees  I  had  seen  in  England. 

I  have  not  been  over  well  since  I  have  been  in 
England.  "  Flying  gout"  I  am  fain  to  call  it,  and 
I  am  now  drinking  Vichy  in  the  hope  to  make  it 
fly  altogether.  But  it  is  pa,rtly  dumps^  I  fancy,  for 
travelling  bores  me  horribly.  I  am  wretched  at 
not  finding  a  letter  from  Mabel  here,  and  J.  H. 
and  Rowse  have  vanished,  leaving  no  sign.  I  shall 
be  all  ready  to  come  over  so  soon  as  I  hear  from 
you.  You  will  find  me  dull,  but  honestly  willing 
to  brighten.  A  few  days  with  you  will  do  me 
infinite  good.  It  is  abroad  that  one  truly  misses 
friends.  At  home  one  is  always  expecting  them 
back,  and  they  do  half  come  back  in  a  thousand 
things  that  daily  recall  them.  But  here  ! 


158  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

To  the  Same. 

11  DOVER  STREET,  PICCADILLY, 
20  September,  1872. 

...  I  will  take  the  room  at  your  hotel  to  be 
gin  on  Monday,  and  shall  without  doubt  be  in 
Paris  on  Monday  night  at  8.15,  according  to  the 
railway  guide.  I  can  only  hope  that  trains  are 
more  punctual  in  France  than  here,  where  I  have 
literally  not  found  one  up  to  time  since  I  landed 
in  Ireland,  and  often  more  than  an  hour  behind 
it.  ... 

My  gout  seems  to  have  left  off  threatening, 
though  it  bullied  me  well  for  some  weeks,  but  I 
have  been  out  of  sorts  ever  since  I  got  here,  why 
I  can't  divine.  We  have  had  letters  from  Mabel,  in 
good  health  and  happy,  which  have  done  me  great 
good.  .  .  . 

To  the  Same. 

HOTEL  DE  LORRAINE,  RUE  DE  BEAUNE,  No.  7, 
16  October,  1872. 

.  .  .  We  like  our  new  quarters  very  much.1 
Moreover,  our  living  (vin  et  bois  y  compris)  costs 
us  about  fifty  francs  a  week  less  than  at  the  Hotel 
Windsor,  and  we  get  a  better  dinner  here  for 
three  francs  than  there  for  six.  Moreover,  every- 

1  After  three  weeks  spent  with  Mr.  Norton  and  his  family 
at  their  hotel  in  Paris,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Lowell  moved  across  the 
river,  upon  the  departure  of  their  friends  to  London.  As  will  he 
seen  later,  this  little  hotel  became  their  familiar  home  whenever 
they  were  in  Paris.  They  endeared  themselves  to  their  host  and 
hostess,  and  long  after  there  hung,  perhaps  still  hangs,  in  the  office, 
a  large  photograph  of  Lowell. 


THIRD  JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  159 

thing  here  is  French.  Even  the  quarter  of  the 
town  where  we  are  has  an  indefinable  Gallic  flavor 
like  the  soupQon  of  garlic  in  their  cookery.  There 
are  three  or  four  regular  habitues  of  the  table 
(dont  trois  decores)  who  seem  to  be  scientific  men  ; 
at  any  rate,  one  is  a  surgeon,  and  another  who  has 
lots  of  esprit  an  avocat,  I  suspect.  On  parle  tou- 
jours  et  quelquefois  tous  ensemble,  aussi  qu'a 
force  d'e*couter  consciencieusement  je  m'habitue 
sans  le  savoir  a  la  langue.  Un  beau  matin  je  me 
trouve  parlant  a  merveille  debitant  les  mots  avec 
toute  1'insouciance  d'un  aqueduc  qui  n'a  pas  aucune 
responsabilite  des  eaux  qu'il  verse.  Si  je  veille 
pendant  la  nuit,  je  m'occupe  a  composer  des  petits 
discours  qui  auraient  mis  le  pen  Massillon  hors  de 
lui  d'envie. 

Je  ne  suis  pas  encore  alle  chez  M.  Littre,  mais 
je  te  remercie  beaucoup  pour  la  lettre  et  la  pre- 
senterai  en  tres  peu  de  jours.  J'ai  achete  une  de 
les  plumes  d'or  que  tu  m'as  louees  mais  soit  la 
pauvrete  du  papier  (a  tres  bon  marche)  ou  bien 
des  idees,  elle  refuse  de  marcher  dans  une  langue 
aussi  facile  que  doit  lui  etre  la  franchise. 

Since  your  departure,  my  dear  boy,  I  have  buca- 
neered  ('t  is  a  free  translation  of  bouquine,  corre 
sponding  to  my  exploits  in  turning  my  native  tongue 
into  French  —  for  I  like  to  be  consistent)  among 
the  stalls,  but  Fortune  packed  her  trunk  (the  bag 
gage  !)  at  the  same  time  with  you,  and  I  have  not 
prospered  much.  One  attribute  of  deity  I  have 
not  arrogated  presumptuously  but  enjoy  by  a  privi 
lege  of  nature,  to  wit  (a  savoir),  that  of  con- 


160  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

founding  the  counsels  of  the  wicked,  for  I  puzzle 
the  dealers  awfully  now  and  then  with  my  dis- 
cours.  I  suppose  it  must  be  that  I  inadvertently 
mix  in  too  much  of  1'ancien  Fran^ais.  'T  is  as  if 
one  should  talk  pure  Chaucer  to  Burnham.1  How 
ever,  I  bought  the  seventeen  volume  Byron  for 
840,  and  have  sent  it  to  my  grandson's  (I  mean 
Petit  fils  —  you  see  how  I  am  getting  translated) 
to  be  bound.  If  it  were  not  for  this  confounded 
pen  (saving  your  reverence)  I  would  write  you  a 
cheerful  letter  —  but  what  can  one  do  when  it  takes 
so  long  to  write  the  first  half  of  a  sentence  that 
one  forgets  the  last  ?  I  assure  you  I  had  several 
clever  things  to  say,  but  they  are  stuck  in  my  pen 
—  a  very  unfortunate  position  of  things,  because 
you  will  see  they  have  gone  out  of  my  head.  .  .  . 

To  the  Same. 

PARIS,  1  November,  1872. 

.  .  .  Now  for  bouquiniste  news.  I  think  I  did 
not  tell  you  that  I  had  picked  up  a  splendid 
quarto  (with  fine  port)  of  Montaigne's  Travels.  It 
is  a  beauty.  Also  Nouveaux  Memoires  pour  ser- 
vir  a  rhistoire  du  Cartesianisme,  a  tiny  tome  in 
vellum  with  Ste.  Beuve's  autograph  and  pencil 
marks.  Best  of  all,  I  got  at  an  auction  Le  Cheva 
lier  au  Cigne,  which  I  have  long  vainly  sought, 
four  volumes  quarto  demi  mar.  for  133.50.  I 
should  not  have  thought  it  dear  at  a  hundred.  I 
am  going  out  presently  after  a  copy  of  the  Poetes 
Champenois,  which  I  have  found  at  Aubry's,  for 

1  A  well  known  second-hand  bookseller  in  Boston. 


THIRD   JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  161 

$180.  Fillet  asked  $350  for  an  incomplete  set. 
After  this  last  extravagance  I  shall  retire  from 
business  for  a  while, -for  I  am  getting  beyond  my 
depth.  Aubry  has  a  copy  of  Renard  bound  for 
840.  Shall  I  buy  it  for  you  ?  It  includes  Cha- 
baille's  supplementary  fifth  volume.  .  .  . 

We  are  having  a  nice  time,  though  I  felt  like 
Dante  when  he  turned  round  and  missed  Virgil, 
when  I  found  that  Rowse  had  flown.  However, 
three  days  after  John  [Holmes]  arrived  in  excel 
lent  health  and  spirits  —  likes  our  hotel,  and  will 
stay  ad  libitum.  His  knee  is  not  quite  right,  but 
otherwise  he  is  robustious.  He  confided  to  me 
yesterday  that  the  first  time  we  walked  out,  he 
wished  me  to  guide  him  to  where  he  could  get 
some  oysters !  He  thought  they  would  quite  set 
him  up.  He  is  very  droll  with  his  German,  and 
delightful  to  the  last  degree.  In  French  he  is  as 
inarticulate  as  one  of  his  favorite  shell-fish.  We 
have  a  little  woman  who  comes  to  talk  with  us  an 
hour  a  day,  and  so  soon  as  I  get  fluid  I  am  going 
to  Littre.  I  already  enter  into  conversation  at 
table  with  gusto. 

To  the,  Same. 

PARIS,  14  November,  1872. 

...  I  am  very  glad  you  sent  the  Emersons  to 
me.  I  have  engaged  him  a  lovely  little  apartment 
au  premier  at  8  f rs.  the  day.  I  think  I  shall  take 
it  myself  when  they  go,  for  I  am  more  and  more 
minded  to  stay  the  winter  through.  We  are  all 
well  and  send  lots  of  love  to  all  of  you.  Fanny  is 


162  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

at  work  on  French  exercises  all  day,  and  as  for  me, 
when  I  get  my  French  suit  of  clothes  I  shall  be  a 
thorough  Gaul.  I  am  ready  for  a  revolution  (or 
at  any  rate  an  e  mute)  to-morrow.  It  is  pretty 
chilly  here  now,  arid  I  almost  wish  the  Commune 
had  put  off  their  bonfires  till  the  middle  of  Novem 
ber,  when  they  would  have  done  some  good.  I  am 
writing  on  a  marble  table,  and  my  fingers  are 
numb  as  gutta  percha. 

To  the  Same. 

PARIS,  6  December,  1872. 

There  has  been  an  untoward  gap  in  my  corre 
spondence,  because  I  have  fallen  back  a  little  into 
home  habits,  and  have  been  pegging  away  at  Old 
French  again.  .  .  .  But  the  days  are  so  short ! 
and  it  has  been  such  gloomy  weather.  Fifty-seven 
days  of  rain,  think  of  it,  and  the  only  excitement 
the  crue  of  the  Seine.  Yes,  we  are  beginning  to 
have  another,  for  we  are  threatened  with  a  revolu 
tion.  The  Right  are  resolved  to  push  things  to 
extremes,  and  would  rather  have  a  military  triumvi 
rate  than  Thiers  with  a  ministry  of  his  own  choos 
ing.  The  French  look  upon  Paris  as  the  metro 
polis  of  the  world,  but  I  am  more  and  more  struck 
with  a  certain  provincialism  of  mind  shown  in  the 
importance  they  attach  to  their  own  personality. 
Every  one  of  them  has  the  flavor  of  a  village 
great  man.  It  is  not  individuality  I  mean,  but 
value  of  self.  No  man  can  bring  himself  to  get 
out  of  the  way,  even  though  it  is  the  country  he  is 
blocking.  I  pick  up  a  good  deal  at  my  table 
d'hote  and  am  more  and  more  pleased  with  it. 


THIRD  JOURNEY  IN   EUROPE  163 

I  have  not  yet  been  to  call  on  Littre,  but  I 
shall  before  long.  My  French  still  refuses  to  go 
trippingly  from  my  tongue.  However,  I  manage 
now  to  converse  at  table,  and  plunge  into  general 
discussion  bravely.  In  the  intervals  of  the  rain 
(for  it  does  not  always  rain  all  day  long,  though  it 
rains  every  day)  I  take  long  walks  in  every  direc 
tion,  and  am  grown  pretty  intimate  with  Paris.  I 
still  like  it  and  the  people.  By  the  way,  Clarice 
(the  maid  who  waits  at  breakfast)  said  to  me  this 
morning :  "  Les  aristocrats  ne  veulent  pas  que  la 
basse  classe  soit  instruite.  Us  croient  que  le  peu- 
ple  sait  trop  deja.  Avec  la  Republique  nous  au- 
rions  1'instruction  obligatoire.  Ah,  ce  serait  une 
chose  tres  bonne  pour  nous."  I  am  inclined  to 
believe  that  the  people  know  more  than  my  friend, 
the  Marquis  de  Grammont,  thinks  ! 

To  the  Same. 

PARIS,  11  January,  1873. 

.  .  .  My  life  runs  on  in  the  same  canal.  A  walk 
before  breakfast  round  the  parallelogram  formed 
by  the  Pont  de  Solferino  at  one  end  and  the  Pont 
des  Arts  at  the  other,  then  a  walk  after  breakfast 
with  John  up  to  the  Pont  Neuf  and  across  to  the 
courtyard  of  the  Tuileries  where  we  sit  and  col 
logue  over  our  cigars,  feeding  the  sparrows  between 
whiles  ;  then  home,  and  John  to  Schiller's  Thirty 
Years'  War  and  I  to  my  Old  French.  In  the  dusk 
I  generally  take  a  longer  walk  by  myself,  or  else 
the  same  one  with  John.  I  have  got  a  whole  closet 
full  of  books,  and  have  reached  the  end  of  my 


164  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

tether,  having  just  received  an  account  from  the 
Barings  showing  that  I  have  overdrawn  £104. 
However,  the  books  are  a  kind  of  investment. 
But  I  begin  to  foresee  that  I  shall  not  stay  abroad 
so  long  as  I  expected.  I  thought  I  was  all  right 
now,  but  as  usual  my  income  is  never  so  large  as 
my  auguries.  Fortunately,  I  like  Cambridge  bet 
ter  than  any  other  spot  of  the  earth's  surface,  and 
if  I  can  only  manage  to  live  there  shall  be  at  ease 

yet.  .  .  . 

To  the  Same. 

PARIS,  18  March,  1873. 

...  I  shall  probably  be  in  England  before  you 
go,  for  Hughes  writes  me  (this  is  between  our 
selves)  that  there  is  a  chance  of  their  giving  me  a 
D.  C.  L.  at  Oxford,  which  I  should  like.  I  am 
not,  I  think,  overfond  of  decorations,  but  I  should 
like  this  one,  for  I  cannot  get  over  a  superstitious 
respect  for  what  goes  into  the  college  triennial 
catalogue. 

To  Thomas  Hughes. 

PARIS,  19  March,  1873. 

.  .  .  What  you  say  of  the  quiet  lives  that  would 
come  to  the  front  in  England  in  a  time  of  stress, 
I  believe  to  be  true  of  us  also.  I  cannot  think 
such  a  character  as  Emerson's  —  one  of  the  sim 
plest  and  noblest  I  have  ever  known  —  a  freak  of 
chance,  and  I  hope  that  my  feeling  that  the  coun 
try  is  growing  worse  is  nothing  more  than  men  of 
my  age  have  always  felt  when  they  looked  back 
to  the  tempus  actum.  ...  If  I  had  dreamed  you 


THIRD  JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  165 

would  have  run  over  to  Paris,  would  n't  I  have  told 
you  where  I  was !  But,  in  fact,  I  have  lingered 
on  here  from  week  to  week  aimlessly,  having  come 
abroad  to  do  nothing,  and  having  thus  far  suc 
ceeded  admirably. 

To  Leslie  Stephen. 

PARIS,  29  April,  1873. 

...  I  think  I  have  made  up  my  mind  to  run 
over  to  London  for  a  day  or  two,  to  bid  the  Nor 
ton  s  good-by,  for  I  cannot  bear  to  have  the  sea 
between  us  before  I  see  them  again.  If  I  do,  I 
shall  arrive  about  the  7th  of  May,  and  I  shall 
count  on  seeing  you  as  much  as  possible.  ...  I 
have  read  your  "  Are  we  Christians  ?  "  and  liked  it, 
of  course,  because  I  found  you  in  it,  and  that  is 
something  that  will  be  dear  to  me  so  long  as  I 
keep  my  wits.  I  think  I  should  say  that  you  lump 
shams  and  conventions  too  solidly  together  in  a 
common  condemnation.  All  conventions  are  not 
shams  by  a  good  deal,  and  we  should  soon  be 
Papuans  without  them.  But  I  dare  say  I  have 
misunderstood  you. 

To  the  Same. 

PARIS,  3  May,  1873. 

I  shall  arrive  Monday  night,  and  have  taken  a 
chamber  at  the  Queen's  Hotel,  which  is  described  to 
me  as  "  somewhere  behind  the  Burlington  Arcade," 
which  is  tolerably  central.  I  shall  not  think  of 
billeting  myself  on  you,  especially  as  you  are  not 
yet  fairly  settled.  But  I  wish  to  see  as  much  of 


166  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

you  as  may  be.  I  must  see  your  new  nest  as  I  did 
the  old  one,  for  that  was  a  great  satisfaction  to  me, 
and  I  recall  it  often  in  fancy.  I  must  make  the 
acquaintance  of  Miss  Laura,  too,  in  whom  I  feel 
an  added  interest  now  that  I  have  got  my  step, 
and  am  a  grandfather.1  You  would  laugh  at  the 
number  of  perambulators  (as  they  call  baby-wagons 
nowadays)  and  ponies  that  I  have  bought  for  that 
wonderful  boy,  as  I  lie  awake  at  night  and  hear 
the  tramp  of  the  sergent  de  ville  under  my  win 
dows.  I  have  carried  him  through  college  so  many 
times,  that  he  must  be  a  prodigy  of  learning  by 
this  time.  I  do  not  know  whether  I  ought  to  be 
tray  it  even  to  you,  but  he  has  more  than  once 
shown  a  tendency  to  be  fast,  though  I  have  re 
claimed  him.  I  am  quite  sure  he  is  steady  now, 
and  does  not  drink  more  than  is  good  for  him. 
That  story  of  the  police  court  was  much  exagger 
ated. 

I  don't  wonder  that  you  feel  sad  at  the  thought 
of  losing  the  Nortons.  They  have  been  and  are  \ 
more  to  me  than  I  can  tell.  But  you  will  see  them 
all  again,  when  you  come  to  make  your  visit  to  me, 
which  I  look  upon  as  pledged.  It  is  as  easy  to  get 
to  us  as  to  Switzerland,  and  you  shall  sleep  now 
and  then  in  the  ice-chest  to  make  you  comfortable. 
The  roof  of  the  barn  is  pretty  slippery  and  the 
ground  below  hard  enough  to  give  you  a  smart 
Alpine  shock.  By  the  way,  what  you  say  about 
Switzerland  in  July  delights  me.  Remember  that 
my  address  is  always  to  the  care  of  the  Barings, 

1  Mrs.  Burnett's  first  child  had  lately  been  born. 


THIRD   JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  167 

and  let  me  know  where  you  are  to  be  and  when. 
I  have  a  sort  of  glimmering  of  Lausanne,  where  I 
could  exist  cheaply,  for  though  on  pleasure  I  am 
bent,  I  am  forced  to  have  a  frugal  mind.  But  I 
am  more  and  more  convinced  that  a  man  (espe 
cially  a  grandfather)  is  most  comfortable  when  he 
has  worn  his  ruts  deepest,  and  I  should  fly  over  the 
deep  to-morrow  if  I  could.  It  is  ignoble,  but  it  is 
true.  I  always  hated  the  sights  qu'il  faut  voir, 
and  now  there  is  no  hope  of  strangeness  anywhere. 
Man  is  a  most  uninventive  animal  —  you  scratch 
through  the  nationality  and  there  he  is  underneath 
—  the  very  bore  you  were  running  away  from. 
However,  I  am  rested  and  grown  so  stout  that  I 
have  positively  had  to  let  out  a  reef  in  my  trousers. 
I  reckon  on  a  very  jolly  time  in  London,  because 
I  shall  always  be  in  the  tremor  of  going  away  — 
though  I  am  almost  sorry  that  I  am  going  when 
I  think  of  saying  good-by  to  the  Nortons.  I  am 
sorry  you  did  not  see  more  of  Emerson ;  he  is  good 
to  love,  and  if  his  head  be  sometimes  in  thin  and 
difficult  air,  his  heart  never  is.  He  must  have  left 
London,  then  ?  Gay  told  me  he  met  you  at  the 
Nortons,  and  kept  calling  you  Stevens,  and  I 
irascibly  correcting  him  as  I  would  a  vicious  proof- 
sheet.  I  don't  know  why,  but  I  am  always  exas 
perated  when  anybody  pluralizes  you.  Whether 
it  is  that  I  hold  you  to  be  unique,  or  that  I  was 
once  cheated  by  a  man  named  Stevens,  I  can't  tell. 
However,  Gay  is  a  good  fellow  and  a  good  artist 
for  all  that.  Why  is  it  that  people  do  so  ?  They 
always  call  Child  Childs  in  the  same  fashion. 


168  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

My  eyes  gave  out  some  time  ago,  so  I  will  only 
say  that  I  shall  go  straight  to  Cleveland  Place 
Tuesday  morning,  and  if  you  dropt  in  on  your  way 
down  town,  it  would  be  the  best  possible  world  so 
long  as  it  lasted. 

To  C.  E.  Norton. 
(Passenger  by  "  Olympus.") 

PARIS,  13  May,  1873. 

I  am  so  wont  to  carry  Home  about  with  me  and 
to  say  "here,"  when  I  mean  Cambridge,  even  in 
Paris,  that  I  did  not  fairly  realize  to  myself  that 
you  were  all  going  away  till  I  was  meditating  over 
my  pipe  on  board  the  Channel  steamer.  I  made 
up  my  mind  that  I  would  fling  an  old  shoe  after 
you  in  the  shape  of  a  good-by  that  should  surprise 
you  after  you  were  fairly  embarked.  I  need  not 
say  how  happy  my  three  days  with  you  in  London 
were,  nor  how  sweet  it  was  to  renew  the  old,  old 
friendship  with  you  all.  We  don't  make  new 
friends,  at  least  not  in  the  same  sense,  for  it  is 
the  privilege  of  old  friendship  that  it  knows  all 
our  weaknesses  and  accounts  for  them  beforehand, 
taking  almost  a  kind  of  pleasure  in  them  as  we  do 
in  bad  weather  that  we  have  prophesied. 

I  wish  I  could  have  gone  with  you  to  Oxford, 
but  Fanny  was  so  happy  at  seeing  me  a  day  sooner  I 
than  she  expected  that  I  was  glad  I  did  n't.     How 
ever,  I  jnade  a  memorandum  never  to  leave  her  ' 
behind  again  in  future.  .  .  .  They  had  taken  good 
care  of  her  while  I  was  away,  for  somehow  or  other 
everybody  in  the  house  is  fond  of  her. 


THIRD  JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  169 

The  best  wish  I  can  make  for  you  is  that  every 
day  of  your  passage  may  be  as  fine  as  this  which 
is  a  mixture  of  all  that  is  sweetest  in  spring  time. 
May  the  dry  masts  of  your  steamer  be  covered  with 
leaves  and  flowers  like  Joseph's  rod,  and  may  the 
porpoises  gamble  about  you  for  the  children's 
sake.  .  .  . 

No  iceberg  come  anig-h  thee, 
No  curdling  east  wind  try  thee, 
The  wreaths  of  the  wake 
Whirl  in  moons  for  thy  sake, 
And  the  fogs  furl  off  and  fly  thee  ! 

My  heart  is  fuller  than  I  dreamed  of  with  this 
parting,  but  it  is  not  foreboding  I  am  sure.  I 
shall  find  you  all  again  after  many  days,  and  we 
shall  have  many  happy  hours  together.  .  .  . 

To  T.  B.  Aldrich. 

PARIS,  28  May,  1873. 

...  I  shall  stay  out  my  two  years,  though  per 
sonally  I  would  rather  be  at  home.  In  certain 
ways  this  side  is  more  agreeable  to  my  tastes  than 
the  other,  —  but  even  the  buttercups  stare  at  me  as 
a  stranger  and  the  birds  have  a  foreign  accent.  .  .  . 

Before  this  reaches  you  I  shall  have  been  over  to 
Oxford  to  get  a  D.  C.  L.  So  by  the  time  you  get 
it  this  will  be  the  letter  of  a  Doctor  and  entitled  to 
the  more  respect.  Perhaps,  in  order  to  get  the 
full  flavor,  you  had  better  read  this  passage  first,  if 
you  happen  to  think  of  it.  Do  you  not  detect  a 
certain  flavor  of  parchment  and  Civil  Law  ?  .  .  . 


170  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

To  Thomas  Hughes. 

PARIS,  2  June,  1873. 

.  .  .  We  shall  leave  Paris  to-morrow  or  next 
day,  stopping  in  Kheims  to  see  the  churches,  at 
Louvain  for  the  Town  House,  and  so  on  to  Ant 
werp,  Ghent,  and  Bruges.  ...  If  I  don't  see  you 
in  Oxford,  I  shall  stop  long  enough  in  London  to 
get  a  glimpse  of  you.  Our  plan  is  to  go  to  Swit 
zerland  and  Germany,  and  so  down  to  Italy  for  the 
winter.  Then  back  to  Paris,  and  so  over  to  Eng 
land  on  our  way  home  next  year.  I  hate  travel 
ling  with  my  whole  soul,  though  I  like  well  enough 
to  "  be  "  in  places.  .  .  . 

To  Mrs.  Lewis  A.  Stimson. 

BRUGES,  25  June,  1873. 

...  I  have  been  over  to  Oxford  to  be  doctored, 
and  had  a  very  pleasant  time  of  it.  You  would 
respect  me  if  you  could  have  seen  me  in  my  scarlet 
gown.  .  .  .  We  go  from  here  in  a  day  or  two  to 
Holland  —  then  up  the  Rhine  to  Switzerland,  where 
we  join  the  Stephens  and  Miss  Thackeray. 

To  C.  E.  Norton. 

VENICE,  30  October,  1873. 

.  .  .  Since  we  left  Bruges,  we  have  been  up  the 
Rhine,  and  then  across  to  Niirnberg,  where  we 
spent  a  fortnight  in  great  contentment.  Before 
this,  however,  we  had  made  a  pretty  good  giro  in 
the  Low  Countries,  going  wherever  there  was  a 
good  cathedral  or  Town  Hall.  .  .  .  When  we 


THIRD  JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  171 

reached  Geneva  we  found  ourselves  so  comfortable 
that  we  stayed  two  months  and  did  some  reading. 
I  liked  the  town,  and  especially  the  walks  in  its 
neighborhood,  very  much.  Then  we  went  to  Cha 
in  onix,  and  then  over  the  Simplon  to  the  Italian 
lakes,  whence  we  came  hither.  Venice  charms  me 
more  than  ever.  We  keep  a  gondola  and  go  about 
leisurely  seeing  all  the  lovely  things.  .  .  .  The 
weather  has  not  been  very  good,  but  there  has  been 
only  one  day  when  we  could  not  go  out  in  the  gon 
dola  without  the  coperto,  either  toward  the  Lido  or 
over  the  lagunes  to  watch  the  sunset,  or  through 
the  smaller  canals  to  find  that  the  very  back  lanes 
of  Venice  are  finer  than  the  highstreets  anywhere 
else.  .  .  . 

I  am  recovering  a  little  facility  in  Italian  —  to 
be  lost  again  when  I  get  beyond  the  daily  sound  of 
it.  I  give  Fanny  a  lesson  every  day  in  the  Pro- 
messi  Sposi,  which  has  so  often  served  as  a  go-cart 
to  those  who  are  learning  to  take  their  first  steps 
in  the  language.  She  reads  aloud  to  me,  so  that  I 
save  my  eyes  and  practise  my  ears  at  the  same 
time.  She  is  a  very  good  scholar  for  she  puts 
zeal  into  whatever  she  does,  and  is  making  great 
progress.  It  is  odd  to  me  how  the  familiar  phrases 
cling  round  my  brain  like  bats  to  the  roof  of  a 
cage,  and  are  set  flying  all  of  a  sudden  by  a  chance 
footfall.  I  am  very  much  struck,  by  the  way,  to 
find  how  much  more  vividly  I  remember  the  Vene 
tian  pictures  than  any  others.  I  can't  help  think 
ing  it  implies  a  peculiar  merit  in  them.  I  recall 
them  as  I  do  natural  objects  —  the  Staubbach  for 
example,  or  Hogarth.  .  .  . 


172  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

To  Thomas  Hughes. 

VENICE,  Thanksgiving  Day,  1873. 
...  I  can't  "  do  "  anything  over  here  except 
study  a  little  now  and  then,  and  I  long  to  get  back 
to  my  reeky  old  den  at  Elmwood.  Then  I  hope  to 
find  I  have  learned  something  in  my  two  years 
abroad.  ...  I  am  looking  forward  to  home  now, 
and  shouldn't  wonder  if  I  took  up  my  work  at 
Harvard  again,  as  they  wish  me  to  do.  We  leave 
Venice  probably  to-morrow  for  Verona.  Thence 
to  Florence,  Rome,  and  Naples.  .  .  . 

As  the  year  1874  opened,  the  question  of  Low 
ell's  return  to  college  work  was  mooted.  He  had 
felt  a  little  piqued  at  being  suffered  to  leave,  after 
sixteen  years'  continuous  service,  without  any  con 
cession  from  the  college.  He  thought  at  least  he 
might  have  been  granted  leave  of  absence  on  half 
pay,  and  when  no  proposal  of  this  sort  was  made, 
he  sent  in  a  definite  resignation.  Now  the  author 
ities  intimated  that  they  hoped  he  would  resume 
his  old  place.  He  was  in  doubt  what  he  should 
do.  He  had  tasted  the  pleasures  of  freedom ;  he 
remembered  well  the  uncongeniality  of  much  of  his 
work  ;  he  was  painfully  conscious  of  lacking  quali 
ties  requisite  for  success  in  the  profession  of  teach 
ing  ;  he  had,  moreover,  been  disturbed  by  physical 
disabilities,  especially  in  a  blurring  of  memory  and 
a  weakness  in  his  head  which  alarmed  him ;  the 
trouble,  he  decided,  was  "  flying^  gout,"  a  disorder  j 
to  which  he  had  been  more  or  less  subject  for 


THIRD  JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  173 

many  years,  and  which  never  left  him  for  long 
after  this  period.  More  disturbing  still  was  the 
"  drop  of  black  blood  "  he  had  inherited  from  his 
mother,  which  was  apt  to  spread  itself  over  the 
pupil  of  his  eye,  darkening  everything,  and,  as  he 
said,  temporarily  inducing  a  mood  of  suspicion  or 
distrust. 

On  the  other  hand,  he  was  at  a  time  of  life  when 
uncertainties  of  income  were  likely  to  create  anx 
iety  rather  than  to  stimulate  exertion.  His  income 
from  the  sale  of  his  land  had  proved  less  than  he 
anticipated,  and  he  felt  the  need  of  a  fixed  in 
crease.  Moreover,  he  found  that  college  life  had 
become  more  of  a  habit  than  he  suspected  ;  the 
putting  of  the  sea  between  him  and  it  did  not 
emancipate  him,  though  it  gave  a  temporary  ex 
hilaration.  He  was  timid  about  experiments  in 
living.  Yet  he  was  unwilling  to  allow  himself  to 
be  governed  in  such  a  matter  wholly  by  financial 
considerations.  As  he  wrote  to  a  friend :  "  If  the 
worst  came,  I  could  sell  my  house  and  go  into  lodg 
ings,  which  perhaps  would  n't  be  so  unwise  after 
all.  At  any  rate,  I  can't  let  that  be  a  prevailing 
motive  to  decide  me  about  so  sacred  an  office  as 
that  of  Teacher." 

"  I  never  was  good  for  much  as  a  professor,"  he 
wrote  to  Mr.  Norton,  2  February,  1874 ;  "  once  a 
week,  perhaps,  at  the  best,  when  I  could  manage  to 
get  into  some  conceit  of  myself,  and  so  could  put  a 
little  of  my  go  into  the  boys.  The  rest  of  the  time 
my  desk  was  as  good  as  I.  And  then,  on  the  other 
hand,  my  being  a  professor  was  n't  good  for  me  — • 


174  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

it  damped  my  gunpowder,  as  it  were,  and  my  mind, 
when  it  took  fire  at  all  (which  was  n't  often), 
drawled  off  in  an  unwilling  fuse  instead  of  leaping 
to  meet  the  first  spark."  There  was,  besides  all 
this,  a  possible  complication  with  a  friend  in  whose 
light  he  would  not  stand,  and  letting  this  tip  the 
scales,  he  wrote  refusing  the  reappointment.  There 
came  in  reply  a  letter  from  the  president  of  the 
college,  removing  the  supposed  complication  and 
setting  the  whole  matter  in  such  a  light  that  Low 
ell  revoked  his  decision  and  accepted  the  appoint 
ment.  It  was  characteristic  of  him,  that  though 
asked  to  send  his  final  answer  before  a  certain 
date,  he  dismissed  the  subject  from  his  mind,  and 
wrote  from  Paris  three  months  later  :  "  I  don't 
know  whether  I  am  a  professor  or  no.  On  the 
second  of  May  it  suddenly  flashed  across  me  that 
I  was  to  say  yes  or  no  before  the  first  of  that 
whimsical  month,  and  that  I  had  forgotten  all 
about  it.  I  meant  to  say  yes  on  the  whole,  but  if 
luck  has  settled  it  no,  perhaps  it 's  for  the  best." 

A  more  consuming  interest  had  driven  profes 
sorships  out  of  his  head.  He  was  in  Florence  at 
ihe  time  of  this  correspondence,  and  in  Florence, 
ioo,  when  he  heard  of  the  death  of  Agassiz,  and  on 
the  eve  of  leaving  for  Rome  he  was  moved  to  write 
that  elegy  which,  if  it  does  not  reach  the  height 
of  his  odes  in  poetical  spirit,  has  that  endearing 
quality  which  will  continue  to  make  it  read  as  long 
as  people  continue  to  take  delight  in  the  verses 
in  which  poets  celebrate  their  friendships.  But 
Goldsmith's  "  Retaliation,"  Longfellow's  Introduc- 


THIRD   JOURNEY  IN   EUROPE  175 

tion  to  the  "  Tales  of  a  Wayside  Inn,"  Emerson's 
"  Adirondacs,"  and  Holmes's  occasional  poems  are 
in  lighter  vein  than  "  Agassiz,"  which  stands  mid 
way  in  poetry  between  such  poems  and  Milton's 
"  Lycidas."  As  in  the  case  of  the  others,  it  has  a 
succession  of  portraits,  but  it  strikes  a  deeper  note  ; 
the  elegiac  quality  is  present,  and  the  complaint,  the 
linking  of  personal  grief  with  universal  emotion, 
the  widening  of  sympathy,  all  serve  to  leave  in  the 
mind  rather  the  mood  of  restless  enquiry  into  deep 
problems  of  life,  than  of  sensitive  appreciation  of 
a  series  of  portraits.  It  is  perhaps  worth  noting 
that  he  had  just  been  reading  Leslie  Stephen's 
"  Essays  on  Free  Thinking  and  Plain  Speaking," 
and  had  been  stirred  by  the  book  into  more  or  less 
of  an  enquiry  of  his  own  attitude  toward  the  £reat 
questions  of  life  and  immortality.  Referring  to 
the  book,  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Norton :  "I  emanci 
pated  myself  long  ago,  and  any  friendly  attempt  to 
knock  off  iny  shackles  is  apt  to  result  in  barking 
my  shins,  don't  you  see  ?  Science  has  scuttled  the 
old  Ship  of  Faith,  and  now  they  would  fain  per 
suade  me  that  there  is  something  dishonest  as  well 
as  undignified  in  drifting  about  on  the  hencoop 
that  I  had  contrived  to  secure  in  the  confusion. 
They  undertake  to  demonstrate  to  me  that  it 's  a 
hencoop  and  an  unworthy  perch  for  a  philosopher. 
But  I  shall  cling  fast.  'T  is  as  good  as  a  line-of- 
battle  ship  if  it  only  keep  my  head  above  water. 
I  am  so  made  that  I  allow  no  distinction  between 
natural  and  supernatural.  There  is  none  for  me. 
I  am  as  supernatural  a  ghost  as  was  ever  met  with. 


176  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

But  I  like  Leslie's  book  all  the  same.  It  is  very 
able,  honest,  and  clever  —  full  of  wit  and  trained 
muscle."  And  to  Mr.  Stephen  himself  he  wrote 
later  :  "  My  only  objection  to  any  part  of  your 
book  is,  that  I  think  our  beliefs  more  a  matter  of 
choice  (natural  selection,  perhaps,  but  anyhow  not 
logical)  than  you  would  admit,  and  that  I  find  no 
fault  with  a  judicious  shutting  of  the  eyes."  1 

When  one  compares  the  portraits  in  "  Agassiz  " 
with  the  earlier  sketches,  sometimes  of  the  same 
persons,  in  "  A  Fable  for  Critics,"  one  finds  it  easy 
to  mark  the  mellower,  richer  tints  in  the  later 
work.  The  poem  was  indeed  almost  a  real  post 
humous  work.  Lowell,  removed  by  an  ocean's 
width  from  his  old  comrades  and  his  familiar 
haunts,  mingled  the  dead  and  the  living  in  his  im 
agination  and  found  in  the  whole  concourse,  headed 
by  Agassiz  himself,  a  microcosm  of  that  world  in 
which  he  took  the  greatest  delight,  the  world  of 
friendly,  wise,  and  witty  men.  As  in  the  case  of 
the  Commemoration  Ode,  it  drew  virtue  from  him, 
for  he  had  put  into  it  a  large  part  of  himself,  and 
had  been  possessed  by  it.  Shortly  after  finishing 
it,  he  wrote  of  his  experience  in  the  composition 
to  Mr.  Norton,2  and  later,  when  there  had  been 
time  for  the  sensation  to  cool,  for  an  interchange 
of  comment  and  criticism,  and  for  the  poem  itself 
to  meet  his  eyes  in  its  printed  form,  he  wrote 
again :  — 

"  To  tell  the  truth,  my  collapse  from  the  happy 
excitement  of  composition  was  so  great,  that  when 

1  Letters,  ii.  125.  2  See  Letters,  ii.  115. 


THIRD  JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  177 

the  poem  came  to  me  in  print,  it  inspired  me  with 
something  like  that  disgust  a  freshman  feels  at 
sight  of  an  empty  bottle  the  next  morning  after 
his  first  debauch.  I  have  not  been  able  to  read  it 
through  yet,  but  have  only  turned  to  such  passages 
as  you  thought  needed  retouching.  In  doing  this 
a  few  others  caught  my  eye.  My  dear  boy,  don't 
you  see  (to  answer  what  I  forgot  before  and  what 
you  remind  me  of  again)  that  Emerson  and  Long 
fellow  are  both,  thank  God,  still  in  the  flesh,  and 
that  I  should  not  have  mentioned  them  at  all,  but 
that  I  saw  them  so  vividly  I  could  n't  help  it. 
This,  too,  is  my  reply  to  what  you  say  of  a  resem 
blance  to  a  passage  in  Eogers  (I  thought  it  was 
Beckford).  I  think  I  see  what  you  mean,  but  I 
regard  it  not,  for  the  thought  is  altogether  unlike, 
and  came  to  me  (as  the  receivers  of  stolen  goods 
say)  in  the  way  of  my  business.  I  had  gone  out 
of  myself  utterly.  I  was  in  the  dining-room  at 
Parker's,  and  when  I  came  back  to  self-conscious 
ness  and  solitude,  it  was  in  another  world  that  I 
awoke,  and  I  was  puzzled  to  say  which.  It  was  a 
case  of  possession  but  not  of  self-possession.  I  was 
cold,  but  my  brain  was  full  of  warm  light,  and  the 
passage  came  to  me  in  its  completeness  without 
any  seeming  intervention  of  mine.  I  was  de 
lighted,  I  confess,  with  this  renewal  of  imagination 
in  me  after  so  many  blank  years.  If  there  be  any 
verbal  coincidence  with  Rogers,  I  shall  be  sur 
prised  and  sorry.  It  had  never  occurred  to  me, 
and  I  think  if  anywhere  it  must  be  in  the  couplet 
beginning :  '  In  this  abstraction.'  But  I  hope  you 


178  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

will  turn  out  to  be  mistaken.  I  am  glad  the  poem 
is  liked,  though  I  cannot  yet  see  it  fairly.  I 
thought  it  should  be  good  by  the  state  in  which 
it  left  me  and  by  the  unconscious  way  in  which  it 
came.  The  only  part  I  composed  was  the  conclud 
ing  verses,  which  I  suspect  to  be  the  weakest  part. 
The  verse  that  cost  me  most  trouble  was  the  first, 
which,  do  what  I  would,  insisted  on  being  as  John 
sonian  as  '  Observation,  with  extensive  view.'  But 
it  is  hard  to  put  a  wire  into  a  verse  without  stiffen 
ing  the  latter. 

"  I  surrendered  the  last  verse  about  Longfellow 
without  a  murmur.  I  spoiled  it  by  thinking  more 
of  the  vehicle  than  what  it  was  to  carry.  But 
Emerson's  nose  must  stand.1  I  will  give  you 
'  shrewd '  instead  of  '  wise,'  however,  for  it  is  better 
and  (I  think)  the  word  that  came  first.  I  have 
not  left  my  opinion  of  either  of  these  two  doubtful, 
for  I  have  celebrated  one  in  prose,  and  the  other 
in  verse,  which  is  more  than  either  of  'em  has  done 
for  me,  go  to  ! 

"  I  thank  you  heartily,  my  dear  Charles,  for  all 
your  criticisms.  I  like  to  hear  them,  and  when  I 
don't  agree  it  is  not  from  self-love,  of  which  (in 
such  matters)  I  have  as  little  as  most  men.  But  I 
have  a  respect  for  things  that  are  given  me,  as  the 
greater  part  of  this  was,  and  my  poetry  ought  to 
show  marks  of  design  if  it  does  n't.  If  I  have  done 
anything  good,  I  owe  it  more  largely  to  your  sym 
pathy,  which  spurred  me  out  of  my  constitutional 
indolence  and  indifference,  than  to  anything  else. 

1  "  While  the  wise  nose's  firm-built  aquiline." 


THIRD  JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  179 

1  like  to  tell  you  so,  for  it  is  true.  I  value  my  own 
natural  gifts  (as  I  think  I  have  a  right)  but  set  no 
great  store  by  my  performance.  \  I  came  into  the 
world  with  a  strong  dose  of  poppy  in  my  veins,  and 
love  dreaming  better  than  doing.  \  This  has  been  a 
great  hindrance  to  me,  and  I  have  struggled  hard 
against  it,  but  never  against  my  consciousness  of 
it."  .  . 

From  Florence  the  Lowells  went,  23  February, 
1874,  to  Home,  and  were  with  the  Story s  at  the 
Palazzo  Barber ini. 

To  C.  E.  Norton. 

ROME,  26  February,  1874. 

...  The  journey  from  Florence  was  one  long 
surprise  in  the  snowy  mountains.  There  is  much 
more  than  common,  and  I  had  never  seen  them 
so  before.  But  the  almond-trees  are  in  blossom. 
Rome  saddens  me,  I  can't  quite  say  how.  My  I 
associations  with  it  are  of  so  peculiar  and  deep  a 
kind,  and  so  astonishingly  undeadened  by  time. 
Generally  I  find  I  have  forgotten  much,  but  here 
all  my  memories  seem  of  yesterday.  .  .  . 

I  have  not  much  time  to  myself  here  in  the  -Pa 
lazzo  Barberini,  as  you  will  easily  fancy.  I  am 
thoroughly  glad  to  find  my  old  friend's  statues  so 
much  to  my  liking.  The  Libyan  Sybil,  the  Sa 
lome  and  the  Electra  I  especially  like.  But  he  is 
now  at  work  on  an  Alcestis  which  will  be  a  long 
way  ahead  of  anything  he  has  done.  It  is  beauti 
fully  simple,  graceful,  and  dignified. 


180  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

To  the  Same. 

ROME,  2  March,  1874. 

.  .  .  The  sun  is  just  about  to  set,  and  I  see  the 
moon  rising  white  over  the  stone  pines  that  senti 
nel  the  gate  of  the  Barberini  Gardens.  We  have 
been  at  Sant'  Onofrio  and  seen  the  incomparable 
view  thence.  We  started  for  the  Vatican,  but  were 
too  late,  and  so  walked  on  to  Sant'  Onofrio.  The 
mountains  are  white  as  Switzerland  —  the  far 
ther  ones  I  mean.  I  hardly  knew  the  road  from 
Florence  hither  for  this  strangeness  of  snow.  But 
the  almond-trees  are  in  blossom,  and  the  daisies 
and  violets  and  other  little  field  flowers  unknown 
tome. 

To  Miss  Norton. 

ALBERGO  CROCOLLE,  NAPOLI, 
Marzo  12,  1874. 

.  .  .  "We  left  Rome  after  a  fortnight's  visit  to 
the  Storys,  which  was  very  pleasant  quoad  the 
old  friends,  but  rather  wild  and  whirling  quoad 
the  new.  Two  receptions  a  week,  one  in  the  after 
noon  and  one  in  the  evening,  were  rather  confusing 
for  wits  so  eremitical  as  mine.  I  am  not  equal  to 
the  grande  monde.  .  .  . 

We  have  been  twice  to  the  incomparable  Mu 
seum,  which  is  to  me  the  most  interesting  in  the 
world.  There  is  the  keyhole  through  which  we 
barbarians  can  peep  into  a  Greek  interior  —  pro 
vincial  Greek,  Roman  Greek  if  you  will,  but  still 
Greek. 


THIRD   JOURNEY  IN  EUROPE  181 

To  C.  E.  Norton. 

HOTEL  DE  LORRAINE, 
7  RUE  DE  BEAUNE,  PARIS,  11  May,  1874. 

...  I  expected  to  arrive  here  a  fortnight  earlier 
than  I  did,  for  the  fine  weather  began  just  as  we 
were  leaving  Rome,  and  I  dawdled  as  one  always 
does  in  that  lovely  air.  I  had  one  delightful  drive 
out  to  the  Tavolato  with  Story,  Dexter,  Wild,  and 
Tilton  the  day  before  we  left.  We  lunched  under 
an  arbor  of  dried  canes,  drank  vino  asciulto,  ate  a 
frittata  and  endless  eggs  al  tegame,  and  were  like 
boys  on  a  half-holiday.  What  a  light  that  was 
half  shadow,  and  what  shadows  that  were  all  light 
were  over  everything  !  .  .  . 

They  explain  all  our  bad  weather  here,  and  it  is 
nearly  all  bad,  by  the  simple  formula  ce  sont  les 
giboulees,  and  you  see  I  have  been  lucky  enough 
to  get  from  a  doctor  in  Rome  a  phrase  that  makes 
me  more  content  under  the  unseasonable  perform 
ances  of  my  own  personal  meteorology.  I  have 
already  accumulated  a  heap  of  catalogues,  but  have 
bought  no  books.  I  shall  buy  a  few  more.  .  .  . 

To  W.  D.  Howells. 

PARIS,  13  May,  1874. 

.  .  .  We  have  taken  our  passage  for  the  24th 
June,  and  shall  arrive,  if  all  go  well,  in  time  for 
the  "  glorious  Fourth."  I  hope  we  shall  find  you 
in  Cambridge.  I  long  to  get  back,  and  yet  am 
just  beginning  to  get  wonted  (as  they  say  of  babies 
and  new  cows)  over  here.  The  delightful  little 


182  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

inn  where  I  am  lodged  is  almost  like  home  to  me, 
and  the  people  are  as  nice  as  can  be.  ... 

To  George,  Putnam. 

PARIS,  19  May,  1874. 

.  .  .  For  my  own  part,  though  I  have  had  a 
great  deal  of  homesickness,  I  come  back  to  Cam 
bridge  rather  sadly.  I  have  not  been  over  well  of 
late.  The  doctor  in  Rome,  however,  gave  my 
troubles  a  name  —  and  that  by  robbing  them  of 
mystery  has  made  them  commonplace.  He  said  it 
was  suppressed  gout.  It  has  a  fancy  of  gripping 
me  in  the  stomach  sometimes,  holding  on  like  a 
slow  fire  for  seven  hours  at  a  time.  It  is  wonder 
ful  how  one  gets  used  to  things,  however.  But  it 
seems  to  be  growing  lighter,  and  I  hope  to  come 
home  robust  and  red.  .  .  . 

To  Thomas  Hughes. 

PARIS,  27  May,  1874. 

To  see  your  handwriting  again  was  almost  like 
taking  you  by  the  hand.  I  seem  next  door  to  you 
here,  the  distance  is  so  short  compared  with  the 
long  ferry  between  me  and  Mabel. 

I  had  no  thought  of  reproaching  you  with  not 
answering  my  note  from  Venice.  I  only  wished 
you  to  know  that  I  had  written,  for  I  should  not 
have  done  it  if  Field  had  not  told  me  you  wished 
to  know  where  I  was.  I  never  write  if  I  can  help 
it,  and  therefore  am  ready  not  only  to  forgive,  but 
even  to  sympathize  with  those  who  have  the  same 
failing. 


THIRD   JOURNEY  IN   EUROPE  183 

If  I  could  get  in  at  Mrs.  Bennett's  again  I 
should  like  it  particularly,  for  I  was  perfectly 
satisfied  there.  She  was  not  a  bit  the  lodging- 
house  landlady  of  tradition,  but  a  really  refined 
woman,  and  her  household  matched  her.  But  I 
fear  that  paradise  is  closed  against  us,  for  when  I 
was  last  in  London  somebody  else  had  discovered 
her,  and  hired  the  whole  house.  If  you  would  be 
good  enough  to  ask  and  let  me  know  I  should  be 
greatly  obliged.  ...  I  should  want  the  lodgings 
for  a  fortnight.  The  steamer's  day  is  put  back  to 
the  23d.  On  the  whole  I  shall  go  back  as  young 
as  I  came  except  my  eyes,  which  fail  me  more  and 

more.  .  .  . 

To  the  Same. 

BRUNSWICK  HOTEL,  LONDON, 
Thursday. 

MY  VERY  DEAR  FRIEND,  —  I  was  hoping  to  see 
your  manly  and  tender  face  once  more  before  I  go, 
but  perhaps  it  is  better  as  it  is,  for  I  hate  farewells 
—  they  always  seem  to  ignore  another  world  by 
the  stress  they  lay  on  the  chances  of  never  meeting 
again  in  this.  We  shall  meet  somewhere,  for  we 
love  one  another.  Your  friendship  has  added  a 
great  sweetness  to  my  life,  whether  I  look  back 
ward  or  forward.  .  .  . 

I  had  a  delightful  visit  to  Cambridge.  Every 
body  was  as  warm  as  the  day  was  cold.  When 
I  go  home  I  shall  try  to  be  half  as  good  as  the 
public  orator  said  I  was.  .  .  .  Good-by  and  God 
bless  you.  With  most  hearty  love, 

Yours  always,  J.  R.  LOWELL. 


184  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

The  reference  in  the  last  sentence  is  to  the  gen 
erous  language  in  which  the  degree  of  Doctor  of 
Laws  was  conferred  upon  him  by  the  University 
of  Cambridge.  He  regarded  the  decoration  as  in 
a  measure  a  friendly  recognition  of  the  Univer 
sity's  daughter  in  the  American  Cambridge,  but 
he  could  not  help  being  pleased  by  it.  "  You  don't 
know,"  he  wrote  to  a  friend,  of  the  public  orator's 
Latin  speech,  "  what  an  odd  kind  of  posthumous 
feeling  it  gives  one." 

The  Lowells  sailed  from  Liverpool  23  June, 
18T4,  and  after  a  foggy  and  rainy  passage  were 
ten  miles  from  Boston  Light  Friday  evening,  3 
July.  There  the  fog  caught  them  again  and  forced 
them  to  lie  off  till  the  morning,  so  that  they 
reached  Cambridge  at  half  after  nine  o'clock  on 
the  Fourth  of  July. 


CHAPTER   XIII 

POLITICS 

1874-1877 

THE  Lowells  returned  at  once  to  Elmwood, 
which  the  Aldrich  family  had  relinquished  on  the 
first  of  July,  and  were  welcomed  by  Mrs.  Burnett 
and  the  first  grandson,  who  had  come  down  from 
Southborough  to  greet  them.  "  He  is  as  strong  and 
good-natured  as  a  young  mastiff,"  Lowell  wrote  a 
week  after  his  return,  to  Mr.  Hughes.  "  I  am  al 
ready  stupidly  in  love  with  him  and  miss  all  day 
long  the  tramp  tramp  of  his  sturdy  feet  along  the 
entry." 

"  Thus  far,"  he  writes  to  Mr.  Godkin,  16  July, 
1874,  "  I  have  nothing  to  complain  of  at  home  but 
the  heat,  which  takes  hold  like  a  bulldog  after 
that  toothless  summer  of  England,  where  they 
have  on  the  whole  the  best  climate  this  side  of 
Dante's  terrestrial  paradise.  The  air  there  always 
seems  native  to  my  lungs.  As  for  my  grandson, 
he  is  a  noble  fellow  and  does  me  great  credit. 
Such  is  human  nature  that  I  find  myself  skipping 
the  intermediate  generation  (which  certainly  in  some 
obscure  way  contributed  to  his  begetting,  as  I  am 
ready  to  admit  when  modestly  argued)  and  look 
ing  upon  him  as  the  authentic  result  of  my  own 


186  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

loins.  I  am  going  to  Southborough  to-day  on  a 
visit  to  him,  for  I  miss  him  woundily.  )If  you 
wish  to  taste  the  real  bouquet  of  life,  I  advise  you 
to  procure  yourself  a  grandson,  whether  by  adop 
tion  or  theft.  >The  cases  of  child-stealing  one  reads 
of  in  the  newspapers  now  and  then  may  all,  I  am 
satisfied,  be  traced  to  this  natural  and  healthy  in 
stinct.  A  grandson  is  one  of  the  necessities  of 
middle  life,  and  may  be  innocently  purloined  (or 
taken  by  right  of  eminent  domain)  on  the  tabula 
in  naufragio  principle.  Get  one,  and  the  Nation 
will  no  longer  offend  anybody.  You  will  feel  at 
peace  with  all  the  world.'*  \ 

The  summer  was  spent  happily  in  the  old  fa 
miliar  home.  Lowell  had  no  impulse  to  stir.  He 
never  could  find  any  reason  for  escaping  to  the 
resorts  in  the  White  Mountains.  "  Why  the  deuce 
people  fly  to  the  mountains  before  the  Last  Day," 
he  wrote  to  Mr.  Aldrich,  u  I  can't  conceive,  but 
when  you  get  over  your  insanity  and  come  back  to 
the  breezy  plains  again  (thermometer  70°  at  half- 
past  eight  this  morning),  I  shall  hope  to  see  you. 
My  catbird  saved  one  sonata  for  the  first  day  of 
my  home-coming  and  has  been  dumb  ever  since." 

Lowell  fell  to  work  at  once  in  his  study,  giving 
laborious  days  to  Old  French  and  Old  English  and 
feeling  a  confidence  which  he  expressed  naively  by 
saying  that  he  used  a  pen  instead  of  a  pencil  in  his 
notes  in  his  books.  When  the  college  term  opened 
in  the  fall,  he  renewed,  his  connection,  walking  up 
and  down  to  his  class-room  and  resuming  his  teach 
ing  of  Dante  and  Old  French.  After  his  death  the 


Mr.  Lowell  in  his  Study 


188  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

ture  went,  Lowell's  intuitive  perception  and  quick 
poetic  sympathy  enabled  him  to  touch  into  life 
what  to  many  scholars  was  a  mere  cadaver  to  be 
dissected ;  but  in  the  historical  treatment,  and 
more  especially  in  the  comparative  method,  he  was 
at  the  disadvantage  of  entering  upon  the  study 
before  the  great  work  had  been  done  in  this  field. 
It  was  probably  on  this  account  that  though  he 
covered  a  good  deal  of  ground  in  his  lectures  to  his 
classes,  he  did  not  avail  himself  of  this  work  for 
publication. 

Besides  his  academic  work,  Lowell  took  up  also 
some  writing,  contributing  verses  during  the  next 
few  months  to  the  Atlantic  and  the  Nation  and 
making  the  last  of  his  studies  in  great  literature 
in  an  article  on  Spenser.  A  large  part  of  the  plea 
sure  of  these  papers  for  him  was  the  opportunity 
it  gave  him  for  a  fresh  reading  of  his  author.  "  I 
have  been  very  busy  with  Spenser,"  he  writes  to 
Mrs.  T.  S.  Perry,  28  February,  1875,  "  about  whom 
»I  hope  to  have  something  in  the  next  N.  A.  R.  I 
have  been  reading  him  through  again.  It  is  as 
good  as  lying  on  one's  back  in  the  summer  woods." 
To  another  friend  he  had  written  just  before  :  "  I 
have  had  a  bath  of  Spenser.  Your  Turkish  are 
nothing  to  him."  It  is  an  illustration  of  the  thor 
oughness  with  which  he  revised  his  work  that  this 
article  on  Spenser  started  as  a  lecture,  but  when  he 
came  to  turn  the  lecture  into  a  paper,  he  retained 
only  a  passage  or  two  of  the  original  form. 

He  confessed  in  a  letter  written  in  the  summer 
of  1875  that  he  had  become  a  quicker  writer  in 


POLITICS  189 

verse  and  slower  in  prose  than  when  he  was 
younger.  The  confession  may  well  have  grown 
out  of  his  experience  in  writing  the  two  centennial 
odes  for  which  he  was  called  on  this  year,  that 
"  For  the  One  Hundredth  Anniversary  of  the  Fight 
at  Concord  Bridge,"  and  that  "  Read  at  Cambridge 
on  the  Hundredth  Anniversary  of  Washington's 
Taking  Command  of  the  American  Army,  3rd 
July,  1775."  Both  were  very  nearly  improvisa 
tions,  the  former  being  written  in  the  two  days 
before  the  celebration,  and  the  latter  at  short 
notice  after  Dr.  Holmes  could  not  be  had.  The 
lyrical  character  of  the  Concord  ode  makes  it  sing 
a  little  more  quickly  to  the  ear  of  youth,  and  I 
think  that  while  there  are  in  it  slight  allusions  to 
the  dead  Hawthorne  and  Thoreau,  there  is  also  a 
faint  echo  of  the  living  Emerson.  It  would  be 
strange  indeed  if  Lowell,  called  thus  to  celebrate 
the  fight  which  had  already  been  celebrated  in  the 
noblest  patriotic  hymn  in  our  literature,  had  not 
had  the  vision  of  Emerson  before  him  as  he  wrote. 
What  Emerson,  who  must  have  been  present,  said 
of  the  ode  we  do  not  know,  but  in  a  letter  written 
after  "  Under  the  Old  Elm  "  had  been  delivered 
and  printed,  Lowell  quotes  his  comment  on  the 
second  Ode.  "  I  went,"  he  says,  "  to  club  on  Sat 
urday  and  nominated  ,  whom  Emerson  sec 
onded.  Longfellow  was  there  and  James  and 
Quincy  and  Dr.  Howe  and  Carter  and  Charlie  L. 
and  I.  We  had  a  very  jolly  club  and  good  talk. 
Emerson  was  tenderly  affectionate.  He  praised 
my  Cambridge  poem,  saying  that  when  he  began 


190  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

it  he  said :  '  Why,  he  has  n't  got  his  genius  on,  but 
presently  I  found  the  tears  in  my  eyes.'  ' 

Into  the  second  Ode  Lowell  put  more  thought 
and  rose  to  the  height  of  his  great  theme,  for  he 
was  able  to  look  at  his  country  from  the  vantage- 
ground  of  the  personality  of  Washington,  and  he 
read  in  the  great  past  an  augury  of  the  future 
which  for  the  moment  at  least  did  not  vex  his  anx 
ious  mind.  "  I  took  advantage  of  the  occasion," 
he  wrote  to  a  correspondent  who  was  Southern 
born,  "  to  hold  out  a  hand  of  kindly  reconciliation 
to  Virginia.  I  could  do  it  with  the  profounder 
feeling,  that  no  family  lost  more  than  mine  by  the 
civil  war.  Three  nephews  (the  hope  of  our  race)\ 
were  killed  in  one  or  other  of  the  Virginia  battles,/ 
and  three  cousins  on  other  of  those  bloody  fields." 

In  these  two  odes  as  well  as  in  the  one  given  on 
the  great  centennial  day,  the  Fourth  of  July,  1876, 
Lowell  spoke  with  no  uncertain  sound  regarding 
those  eternal  truths  of  freedom  and  country  which 
made  patriotism  with  him  a  solemn  passion.  But 
so  much  the  more  impossible  was  it  for  him  to  close 
his  eyes  to  the  signs  of  defection  from  high  ideals, 
or  his  lips  when  the  impulse  of  speech  came  to 
him.  In  his  poem  on  Agassiz  written  while  still 
in  Europe  and  obliged,  as  he  has  elsewhere  said, 
always  to  be  on  the  defensive,  he  gave  expression  ( 
to  his  deep  scorn  in  a  few  lines  which  have  not 
lost  their  sting,  though  a  quarter  of  a  century  has  I 
passed  since  they  were  written.  No  one  whose 
memory  carries  him  back  to  the  days  of  Grant's 
second  administration  can  forget  the  breathless 


POLITICS  191 

fear  of  what  next  might  be  disclosed,  and  an 
American  like  Lowell,  compelled  to  read  the  ele 
gant  extracts  of  peculation  and  fraud  in  high  places 
which  the  English  press  in  those  days  culled  as 
examples  of  American  public  life,  was  even  more 
keenly  impressed  than  if  he  were  in  the  midst  of  it 
all  and  could  yet  brace  himself  with  the  knowledge 
of  better  things  mingled  with  these.1  But  the 
second  stanza  of  the  Agassiz  was  mild  compared 
with  the  condensed  bitterness  of  "  The  World's 
Fair,  1876,"  which  he  printed  in  the  Nation,  or 
the  sarcastic  arraignment  in  "  Tempora  Mutan- 
tur,"  printed  in  the  same  journal.  The  longer 
poem,  with  its  etchings  of  Tweed  and  Fisk,  bitten 
in  with  an  acid  that  is  keener  than  any  used  in  the 
"  Biglow  Papers,"  is  preserved  in  "  Heartsease  and 
Rue,"  a  record  of  shame  that  is  wholesomely  un 
pleasant  to  recall  whenever  one  is  disposed  to  be 
complacent.  The  other  was  set  up  for  the  same 
volume,  but  afterward  withdrawn.  It  could  well 
be  spared  from  Lowell's  works,  but  has  a  stronger 
claim  in  a  record  of  his  life  and  character. 

1  The  verse  in  "  Agassiz  "  which  cut  deepest  was  that  contain 
ing  the  lines 

"  And  all  the  unwholesomeness 
The  Land  of  Broken  Promise  serves  of  late 
To  teach  the  Old  World  how  to  wait." 

When  he  reprinted  in  the  poem  in  Heartsease  and  Rue,  Lowell 
made  some  verbal  changes,  and  in  this  passage  substituted  "  the 
Land  of  Honest  Abraham  "  for  "  the  Land  of  Broken  Promise." 
One  may  ponder  over  the  change  and  settle  it  with  himself  which 
stings  more,  irony  or  sarcasm. 


192  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 


THE  WORLD'S  FAIR,  1876. 

Columbia,  puzzled  what  she  should  display 
Of  true  home-make  on  her  Centennial  Day, 
Asked  Brother  Jonathan  :  he  scratched  his  head, 
Whittled  a  while  reflectively,  and  said, 
44  Your  own  invention  and  own  making1,  too  ? 
Why,  any  child  could  tell  ye  what  to  do  : 
Show  'em  your  Civil  Service,  and  explain 
How  all  men's  loss  is  everybody's  gain  ; 
Show  your  new  patent  to  increase  your  rents 
By  paying  quarters  for  collecting  cents ; 
Show  your  short  cut  to  cure  financial  ills 
By  making  paper  collars  current  bills  ; 
Show  your  new  bleaching-process,  cheap  and  brief, 
To  wit,  a  jury  chosen  by  the  thief  ; 
Show  your  State  Legislatures ;  show  your  Rings  ; 
And  challenge  Europe  to  produce  such  things 
As  high  officials  sitting  half  in  sight 
To  share  the  plunder  and  to  fix  things  right. 
\x       If  that  don't  fetch  her,  why,  you  only  need 

To  show  your  latest  style  in  martyrs,  —  Tweed  : 
She  '11  find  it  hard  to  hide  her  spiteful  tears 
At  such  advance  in  one  poor  hundred  years." 

These  verses,  as  may  readily  be  guessed,  brought 
out  wrathful  rejoinders,  and  Lowell  was  accused  of 
having  made  a  cheap  exchange  of  his  democratic 
principles  for  aristocratic  snobberies  when  absent 
from  his  country.  The  situation  called  out  a  vig 
orous  defence  of  Lowell  in  an  article  by  Mr.  Joel 
Benton,  entitled  "  Mr.  Lowell's  Recent  Political 
Verse,"  which  was  published  in  The  Christian 
Union  of  10  December,  1875.  Lowell  acknow 
ledged  the  service  in  a  letter  to  Mr.  Benton  which 
was  printed  after  Lowell's  death  in  The  Century 
Magazine,  November,  1891.  It  is  so  valuable 


V 

POLITICS  193 

a  witness  to  Lowell's  mind  that  I  give  it  here 
again.1 

To  Joel  Benton. 

ELMWOOD,  January  19,  1876. 

DEAR  SIR,  —  I  thank  you  for  the  manly  way  in 
which  you  put  yourself  at  my  side  when  I  had 
fallen  among  thieves,  still  more  for  the  fitting  and 
well-considered  words  with  which  you  confirm  and 
maintain  my  side  of  the  quarrel.  At  my  time  of 
life  one  is  not  apt  to  vex  his  soul  at  any  criticism, 
but  I  confess  that  in  this  case  I  was  more  than 
annoyed,  I  was  even  saddened.  For  what  was  said 
was  so  childish  and  showed  such  shallowness,  such 
levity,  and  such  dulness  of  apprehension  both  in 
politics  and  morals  on  the  part  of  those  who  claim 
to  direct  public  opinion  (as,  alas !  they  too  often 
do)  as  to  confirm  me  in  my  gravest  apprehensions. 
I  believe  "  The  World's  Fair  "  gave  the  greatest 
offence.  They  had  not  even  the  wit  to  see  that  I 
put  my  sarcasm  into  the  mouth  of  Brother  Jona 
than,  thereby  implying  and  meaning  to  imply  that 
the  common-sense  of  my  countrymen  was  awaken 
ing  to  the  facts,  and  that  therefore  things  were 
perhaps  not  so  desperate  as  they  seemed. 

I  had  just  come  home  from  a  two  years'  stay  in 
Europe,  so  it  was  discovered  that  I  had  been  cor 
rupted  by  association  with  foreign  aristocracies  ! 
I  need  not  say  to  you  that  the  society  I  frequented 
in  Europe  was  what  it  is  at  home  —  that  of  my 

1  The  letter  was  also  printed  by  Mr.  Norton  in  Letters,  -with  a 
few  of  the  omitted  passages  filled  in. 


194  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

wife,  my  studies,  and  the  best  nature  and  art  within 
my  reach.  But  I  confess  that  I  was  embittered  by 
my  experience.  Wherever  I  went  I  was  put  on 
the  defensive.  Whatever  extracts  I  saw  from 
American  papers  told  of  some  new  fraud  or  defal 
cation,  public  or  private.  It  was  sixteen  years 
since  my  last  visit  abroad,  and  I  found  a  very 
striking  change  in  the  feeling  towards  America 
and  Americans.  An  Englishman  was  everywhere 
treated  with  a  certain  deference :  Americans  were 
at  best  tolerated.  The  example  of  America  was 
everywhere  urged  in  France  as  an  argument 
against  republican  forms  of  government.  It  was 
fruitless  to  say  that  the  people  were  still  sound 
when  the  Body  Politic  which  draws  its  life  from 
them  showed  such  blotches  and  sores.  I  came 
home,  and  instead  of  wrath  at  such  abominations, 
I  found  banter.  I  was  profoundly  shocked,  for  I 
had  received  my  earliest  impressions  in  a  commu 
nity  the  most  virtuous,  I  believe,  that  ever  existed. 
.  .  .  On  my  return  I  found  that  community  strug 
gling  half  hopelessly  to  prevent  General  Butler 
from  being  put  in  its  highest  office  against  the  will 
of  all  its  best  citizens.  I  found  Boutwell,  one  of 
its  senators,  a  chief  obstacle  to  Civil-Service  re 
form  (our  main  hope).  ...  I  saw  Banks  returned 
by  a  larger  majority  than  any  other  member  of  the 
lower  house.  ...  In  the  Commonwealth  that  built 
the  first  free  school  and  the  first  college,  I  heard 
culture  openly  derided.  I  suppose  I  like  to  be 
liked  as  well  as  other  men.  Certainly  I  would 
rather  be  left  to  my  studies  than  meddle  with  poli- 


POLITICS  195 

tics.  But  I  had  attained  to  some  consideration, 
and  my  duty  was  plain.  I  wrote  what  I  did  in  the 
plainest  way,  that  he  who  ran  might  read,  and  that 
I  hit  the  mark  I  aimed  at  is  proved  by  the  attacks 
against  which  you  so  generously  defend  me.  These 
fellows  have  no  notion  what  love  of  country  means. 
It  is  in  my  very  blood  and  bones.  If  I  am  not  an 
American,  who  ever  was  ? 

I  am  no  pessimist,  nor  ever  was,  .  .  .  but  is  not 
the  Beecher  horror  disheartening?  Is  not  Delano 
discouraging?  and  Babcock  atop  of  him?  .  .  . 
What  fills  me  with  doubt  and  dismay  is  the  degra 
dation  of  the  moral  tone.  Is  it  or  is  it  not  a  result 
of  Democracy  ?  Is  ours  a  "  government  of  the 
people  by  the  people  for  the  people,"  or  a  Kakis- 
tocracy  rather,  for  the  benefit  of  knaves  at  the  cost 
of  fools  ?  Democracy  is,  after  all,  nothing  more 
than  an  experiment  like  another,  and  I  know  only 
one  way  of  judging  it  —  by  its  results.  Demo 
cracy  in  itself  is  no  more  sacred  than  monarchy. 
It  is  Man  who  is  sacred  ;  it  is  his  duties  and  oppor 
tunities,  not  his  rights,  that  nowadays  need  rein 
forcement.  It  is  honor,  justice,  culture,  that  make 
liberty  invaluable,  else  worse  than  worthless  if  it 
mean  only  freedom  to  be  base  and  brutal.  As 
things  have  been  going  lately,  it  would  surprise  no 
one  if  the  officers  who  had  Tweed  in  charge  should 
demand  a  reward  for  their  connivance  in  the  eva 
sion  of  that  popular  hero.  I  am  old  enough  to 
remember  many  things,  and  what  I  remember  I 
meditate  upon.  My  opinions  do  not  live  from  hand 
to  mouth.  And  so  long  as  I  live  I  will  be  no  writer 


196  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

of  birthday  odes  to  King  Demos  any  more  than  I 
would  be  to  King  Log,  nor  shall  I  think  our  cant 
any  more  sacred  than  any  other.  Let  us  all  work 
together  (and  the  task  will  need  us  all)  to  make 
Democracy  possible.  It  certainly  is  no  invention 
to  go  of  itself  any  more  than  the  perpetual  motion. 
Forgive  me  for  this  long  letter  of  justification, 
which  I  am  willing  to  write  for  your  friendly  eye, 
though  I  should  scorn  to  make  any  public  defence. 
Let  the  tenor  of  my  life  and  writings  defend  me. 
Cordially  yours,  J.  R.  LOWELL. 

The  article  on  Spenser,  as  I  have  said,  was  the 
last  of  the  series  of  considerable  studies  of  great 
authors  which  Lowell  had  been  writing  for  the 
past  ten  years,  and  he  now  gathered  the  final  sheaf 
into  a  second  series  of  "  Among  My  Books,"  which 
he  had  hoped  to  bring  out  in  the  fall  of  1875,  but 
which  did  not  appear  until  the  spring  of  1876. 
His  activity  in  literature,  and  the  accumulation  of 
his  published  writings,  were  making  him  more 
steadily  a  conspicuous  figure  and  calling  out  appre 
ciation  and  criticisms.  To  Mrs.  Herrick,  who  had 
been  collecting  material  for  an  article  on  him, 
and  had  applied  to  him  for  facts  and  dates,  he 
wrote,  6  October,  1875,  after  the  appearance  of 
her  article  :  "  If  I  were  not  pleased  with  what  you 
have  written  about  me,  I*  must  indeed  be  difficult, 
as  the  French  say.  It  is  not  for  me  to  comment 
on  your  discrimination,  but  I  cannot  be  insensible 
to  the  truly  feminine  grace  and  delicate  fervor  of 
sympathy  which  run  through  the  whole  article.  .  .  . 


POLITICS  197 

You  have  given  me  a  real  pleasure  and  a  real 
encouragement.  I  have  never  seen  any  of  Mr. 
Wilkinson's  criticisms  upon  me,1  but  I  know  no 
reason  to  suspect  any  personal  spite.  He  is  ludi 
crously  wide  of  the  mark  in  what  he  says  of  the 
early  reception  of  my  writings  at  home  and  the 
later  in  England.  I  never  belonged  to  any  clique 
here,  and  the  highest  appreciation  I  ever  received 
in  England  (degrees  from  Oxford  and  Cambridge) 
were  when  the  Geneva  delegation  had  left  a  very 
bitter  feeling  against  everything  American.  I  say 
this  only  for  your  friendly  ears.  I  dare  say  I  may 
seem  to  contradict  myself  sometimes,  for  my  temper 
of  mind  is  such  that  I  never  have  the  patience  to 
read  over  again  what  I  have  once  printed.  As  for 
my  grammar,  you  may  be  quite  easy.  I  know 
quite  as  much  about  English  as  Mr.  W.  is  likely 
to  do,  and  inherited  my  grammar,  which  is  the 
best  way  of  getting  it.  I  think  (from  what  others 
have  told  me)  that  you  hit  the  nail  on  the  head  in 
saying  that  I  have  a  kind  of  '  vitality.'  But  it  is 
not  wise  to  discuss  one's  own  qualities.  I  will  only 
say  that  if  nature  had  made  me  as  strong  in  the 

1  The  reference  is  to  a  volume  by  Mr.  William  Cleaver  Wilkin 
son,  entitled  A.  Free  Lance  in  the  Field  of  Life  and  Letters,  pub 
lished  in  1874,  which  contained  three  papers  on  "  Mr.  Lowell's 
Poetry,"  "Mr.  Lowell's  '  Cathedral,'  "  and  "  Mr.  Lowell's  Prose." 
In  a  letter  to  Mrs.  Clifford  (Letters,  ii.  290)  Lowell  refers  to  this 
book  apparently  when  he  says :  ''  You  will  be  glad  to  hear  that  a 
man  once  devoted  an  entire  volume  to  the  exposure  of  my  sole 
cisms,  or  whatever  he  chose  to  call  them.  I  nev^r  read  it  —  lest 
it  should  spoil  my  style  by  making-  it  conscious."  The  papers  on 
Lowell  constitute,  however,  less  than  a  third  of  Mr,  Wilkinson's 
book. 


198  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

driving  as  in  the  conceptive  faculties  I  should  have 
done  more  and  better. 

"  I  am  glad  your  article  is  fairly  over  and  out 
of  the  way,  for  now  I  can  enjoy  the  pleasure  of 
your  friendship  without  any  feeling  of  awkward 
ness.  That  I  have  been  a  help  to  you  is  a  help  to 
myself,  and  I  thank  you  for  telling  me  of  it  so 
frankly. 

"  When  I  wrote  you  last  I  was  still  very  far 
from  well.  I  am  now  (though  not  recovered)  very 
much  better,  and  my  wits  are  beginning  to  clear 
again." 

His  birthday  in  1876  found  him  reflecting  on 
the  degree  to  which  he  was  absconding  from  active 
life.  "  I  get  so  absorbed,"  he  writes,  "  in  the 
pretty  shadows  on  the  surface  of  Time,  that  I 
never  notice  the  flowing  of  the  current,  and  while 
I  am  musing,  behold  it  has  brought  Next  Year 
abreast  of  me.  ...  I  am  going  to  dine  with  Gray, 
C.  J.,  this  afternoon  to  meet  the  Friday  Club.  I 
am  invited  to  join  it,  and  have  been  pondering 
over  my  answer  these  six  weeks.  I  feel  as  if  it 
might  shake  me  up  a  little,  for  solitude  is  gradu 
ally  making  me  numb.  But  I  don't  know.  I  have 
the  best  possible  Swift  in  my  head,  if  I  could  only 
get  him  out.  I  have  half  written  it  twice,  and  am 
now  going  to  begin  again.  You  don't  believe  me 
when  I  tell  you  that  my  mind  is  sluggish,  but  it 
is."  Apparently  he  had  planned  a  paper  on  Swift 
of  the  proportions  of  one  of  his  North  American 
articles ;  what  actually  appeared  was  a  brief  review 
of  Forster's  "  Life  of  Swift  "  in  the  Nation.  He 


POLITICS  199 

wrote  but  little  verse,  though  he  was  not  neglectful 
of  the  work  of  others.  "  By  the  way,"  he  wrote  to 
Mr.  Howells,  21  March,  1875,  "who  is  Edgar 
Fawcett  ?  Those  '  Immortelles  '  of  his  in  the  last 
Atlantic  are  in  my  judgment  easily  the  best  poetry 
in  the  number.  I  have  been  taken  with  things  of 
his  before,  I  remember.  Why  did  you  let  the 
other  man  (whose  name  I  have  forgotten)  spoil  a 
charming  little  poem  by  writing  Ac'ta^on  ?  I  doubfc 
if  Artemis  would  have  wasted  an  arrow  in  him  — 
but  Pallas  Athene  would  have  given  him  the  ferule. 
It  was  so  light  and  pretty,  all  the  rest  of  it." 

In  a  nature  like  Lowell's  there  is  more  the  ajp- 
pearance  of  sluggishness  than  the  reality.  His 
industry  is  evident  enough  when  one  adds  his  pub 
lished  and  uncollected  writings  to  his  regular  aca 
demic  duties.  What  may  easily  have  provoked 
the  popular  notion  of  his  indolence  was  the  privacy 
of  his  life,  the  fact  that  he  himself  was  little  en 
evidence,  and  the  casual  on-looker  seeing  him  sit 
ting  for  hours  over  his  books  and  pipe,  taking  his 
social  recreation  only  in  the  seclusion  of  his  own 
cherished  home,  and  the  libraries  and  dining-rooms 
of  a  very  small  circle  of  friends,  hardly  ever  going 
even  to  Boston,  and  drawn  when  on  his  feet  rather 
to  Beaver  Brook  than  to  the  pavements,  —  such  an 
one  might  fancy  him  almost  a  scholarly  recluse, 
living  anywhere  but  in  the  American  present. 

But  a  great  deal  of  the  bustle  of  other  men's 
lives  had  its  sphere  of  activity  in  Lowell's  mind. 
He  was  wont  to  retreat  within  himself,  but  it 
was  to  reflect  on  whatTnlTsaw  in  the  world  about 


200  JAMES    RUSSELL  LOWELL 

him.  As  has  been  seen  already,  he  had  com 
mented  on  public  affairs  in  verse  which  was  not  to 
be  credited  to  his  poetic  sense  so  much  as  to  his 
moral  and  political  insight,  and  the  tide  of  feeling 
was  rising  in  his  soul.  It  needed  occasion  only  to 
bring  him  more  actively  into  the  current  of  affairs. 
The  changing  of  the  time  of  which  he  had  writ 
ten  so  caustically  had  brought  about  what  many 
to-day  are  disposed  to  regard  as  the  lowest  ebb  of 
politics  within  the  memory  of  man.  As  Grant's 
second  administration  drew  near  its  close,  there 
began  to  be  a  stirring  in  the  minds  of  men,  and  a 
.?  resolution  to  reform  the  administration  of  govern- 
V  ment.  The  spectacle  especially  of  the  Southern 
States  held  in  control  by  a  combination  of  Northern 
carpet-baggers  and  negro  politicians,  backed  by  the 
Federal  army,  was  one  which  filled  with  dismay 
those  who  had  seen  in  the  abolition  of  slavery  the 
beginning  of  a  new  life  for  the  nation  ;  and  the 
sordid  view  of  public  life  which  had  resulted  from 
this  and  from  the  unchecked  abuse  of  political 
power  in  the  distribution  of  public  offices  as  re 
wards  for  party  service,  was  leading  to  a  deter 
mined  effort  at  a  reform  of  the  whole  civil  service. 
Lowell's  letters  at  this  time  indicate  how  deeply 
he  felt  the  needs  of  the  hour.  In  the  spring  of 
1876  a  number  of  young  Cambridge  men  were 
inspired  with  a  zeal  to  better  the  morale  of  the  Re-  \ 
publican  party,  which  was  the  party  in  power  and 
the  one  whose  traditions  made  its  better  element 
ardent  to  purify  it  from  the  corruption  which 
seemed  to  be  fastening  upon  it.  The  effect  of  this 


POLITICS  201 

rally  was  to  call  a  large  public  meeting,  and  Lowell 
was  invited  to  preside. 

"  Though  I  don't  think  the  function  you  wish 
me  to  perform,"  he  wrote  in  reply,  "  quite  in  my 
line,  I  am  willing  to  do  anything  which  may  be 
thought  helpful  in  a  movement  of  which  I  heartily 
approve.  I  am  not  so  hopeful,  I  confess,  as  I  was 
thirty  years  ago ;  yet,  if  there  be  any  hope,  it  is  in 
getting  independent  thinkers  to  be  independent 
voters." 

Here  Lowell  struck  the  note  which  had  been 
the  key  of  his  political  writing  in  the  agitation 
against  slavery,  and  that  in  which  all  his  active 
political  life  after  this  was  to  be  pitched.  Inde 
pendence,  not  in  politics  only  but  in  the  entire 
domain  of  human  thought,  had  indeed  been  charac 
teristic  of  all  his  work  heretofore,  and  it  was  the 
solitariness  of  a  life  thus  attuned  which  led  to  this 
slight  expression  of  dejection.  But  he  had  been 
for  all  that  a  leader  of  the  intellectual  and  thought 
ful  class  in  America,  and  it  was  a  happy  omen  that 
collegians  were  in  the  group  which  was  now  to  call 
him  from  his  study  into  the  field  of  political  life. 

Lowell  not  only  presided  at  the  meeting  in  Cam 
bridge,  but  he  became  permanent  chairman  of  the 
committee  then  formed  for  the  organization  of 
voters  in  Cambridge,  a  function  which  had  been 
performed  hitherto  ~by  office-holders  under  the 
government.  The  Congressional  district  to  which 
Cambridge  belonged  then  included  also  Jamaica 
Plain,  and  similar  action  was  taken  there  under  the 
leadership  of  the  Rev.  James  Freeman  Clarke. 


202  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

As  a  result  of  the  movement  Lowell  and  Dr. 
Clarke  were  selected  at  the  district  convention  as 
delegates  to  the  Republican  convention  in  Cincin 
nati  which  was  to  nominate  a  candidate  for  the 
presidency.1 

Lowell  was  very  much  interested  in  the  position 
in  which  he  found  himself,  nor  could  he  help  look 
ing  at  himself  in  this  new  role  with  an  amusing 
distrust.  "  Last  night,"  he  wrote  to  Leslie  Ste 
phen,  10  April,  1876,  "  I  appeared  in  a  new  capa 
city  as  chairman  of  a  political  meeting,  where  I 
fear  I  made  an  ass  of  myself.  It  was  got  up  by 
young  men  who  wish  to  rouse  people  to  their  duty 
in  attending  caucuses  and  getting  them  out  of  the 
hands  of  the  professionals.  ...  I  think  the  row 
is  likely  to  do  good,  however,  in  getting  us  better 
candidates  in  the  next  presidential  election,  and 
waking  everybody  up  to  the  screaming  necessity  of 
reform  in  our  Civil  Service." 

It  was  about  this  time  also,  apparently,  that 
Lowell's  name  began  to  be  connected  with  the  di 
plomatic  service  of  the  country.  It  would  seem  as 
if  his  old  friend  Robert  Carter  had  interested  him 
self  in  the  matter.  At  any  rate,  Lowell  wrote 
him  13  April,  1876 :  "  I  am  much  obliged  to  you 
for  your  friendly  interest,  but  you  misunderstood 
my  note  to  Page.  I  wrote  it  in  haste  to  save  the 
mail  at  John's  room,  borrowing  therefor  his  last 
sheet  of  paper.  What  I  meant  to  say  was  that  if, 
when  the  Eussian  Embassy  was  offered  me,  it  had 

1  See,  for  further  detail,  Mr.  E.  P.  Bliss's  statement  in  Letters, 
ii.  160,  161,  footnote. 


POLITICS  203 

been  the  English  instead,  I  should  have  hesitated 
before  saying  no.  But  with  the  salary  cut  down 
as  it  is  now,  I  couldn't  afford  to  take  it,  for  I 
could  not  support  it  decently."  A  glimpse  of  his 
financial  embarrassment  at  this  time  is  seen  in  a 
letter  to  the  same  correspondent  two  days  later, 
when,  replying  to  the  request  for  the  gift,  appar 
ently,  of  his  Fourth  of  July  Ode  to  a  newspaper, 
he  says  :  "  I  can't  afford  to  give  it  away.  The 
greater  part  of  my  income  was  from  Western  rail 
road  bonds  that  have  stopped  payment,  and  the 
Atlantic  (to  which  I  have  promised  what  I  may 
write)  will  pay  me  1300  for  it."  On  the  19th  of 
April,  he  writes  again  to  Mr.  Carter  :  "  I  return 
Mr.  Fisn's  letter.  There  is  no  more  chance  of 
their  sending  me  to  St.  James's  than  to  the  moon, 
though  I  might  not  be  unwilling  to  go.  On  the 
old  salary  I  might  manage,  and  it  might  do  my 
health  good.  I  have  little  doubt  it  was  offered  ' 
to  L[ongfellow]  with  the  understanding  that  he 
would  decline.  I  have  not  seen  him  for  a  few 
days.  But  it  is  too  large  a  plum  for  anybody  not 
4  inside  politics.'  It  is  the  only  mission  where  the 
vernacular  sufficeth.  Meanwhile  you  will  be 
amused  to  hear  that  I  am  getting  inside  politics 
after  a  fashion.  I  shall  probably  head  the  delega 
tion  from  our  ward  to  the  State  convention." 

Lowell  went  to  the  National  Convention  at  Cin 
cinnati,  like  others  of  the  same  mind,  with  the  hope 
of  securing  the  nomination  for  the  presidency  for 
Mr.  Bristow  of  Kentucky,  who  as  a  member  of/ 
Grant's  cabinet  had  shown  himself  very  active  in 


204  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  prosecution  of  malfeasants.  The  fact,  more 
over,  that  he  came  from  Kentucky  was  an  addi 
tional  reason  in  Lowell's  mind.  "  I  believed,"  he 
wrote,  "  that  a  Kentucky  candidate  might  at  least 
give  the  starting-point  for  a  party  at  the  South 
whose  line  of  division  should  be  other  than  sec 
tional,  and  by  which  the  natural  sympathy  between 
reasonable  and  honest  men  at  the  North  and  the 
South  should  have  a  fair  chance  to  reassert  itself. 
We  failed,  but  at  least  succeeded  in  preventing  the 
nomination  of  a  man  1  whose  success  in  the  Con 
vention  (he  would  have  been  beaten  disastrously  at 
the  polls)  would  have  been  a  lesson  to  American 
youth  that  selfish  partisanship  is  a  set-off  for  vul 
garity  of  character  and  obtuseness  of  moral  sense. 
I  am  proud  to  say  that  it  was  New  England  that 
defeated  the  New  England  candidate."  2 

In  a  letter  written  at  two  different  times  in  the 
summer  of  1876,  to  Thomas  Hughes,3  Lowell 
dwells  at  length  upon  the  political  situation  and 
his  own  hopes  and  fears.  His  attitude  toward  pub 
lic  affairs  was  that  of  one  who  had  not  abandoned 
his  fundamental  beliefs  but  was  questioning  the 
methods  of  carrying  them  out.  and  was  distrustful 
of  existing  machinery.  He  reiterates  his  convic 
tion  that  the  war  was  fought  for  nationality,  and 
that  emancipation  was  a  very  welcome  incident. 
Hence  he  is  inclined  to  lay  the  emphasis  in  re 
union  on  the  need  of  reconciliation  with  the  South 
ern  whites  rather  than  on  the  protection  of  the 
blacks.  He  is  disposed  to  sympathize  with  the 

1  Mr.  Elaine.          2  Letters,  ii.  171.          3  Letters,  ii.  173-178. 


POLITICS  205 

Democratic  party  at  the  South  but  cannot  over 
come  his  distrust  of  the  party  as  a  whole.  He  bids 
his  correspondent  go  slow  in  England  in  extending 
the  suffrage,  but  he  reasserts  his  unshaken  faith  in 
the  people  of  his  country.  As  the  summer  wears 
away  he  is  more  impatient  over  the  confusion  of 
issues,  but  on  the  whole  thinks  he  shall  vote  for 
Hayes. 

Lowell's  new  interest  in  politics  and  his  slight 
active  part  led  his  neighbors  to  wish  to  send  him 
to  Congress  as  representative  from  his  district,  and 
he  was  urged  to  stand,  but  he  resolutely  refused, 
confident  that  he  had  not  the  true  qualifications  for 
the  office,  though  he  was  touched  by  the  confidence 
shown  in  him.  •  He  did,  however,  accept  the  honor-  ,  j 
able  position  of  presidential  elector  on  the  Repub 
lican  ballot.^  He  let  off  a  little  of  his  mind  in  the 
first  draft  of  the  verses  "  In  an  Album,"  where 
the  last  four  lines  of  the  first  stanza  read  :  — 

"  While  many  a  page  of  bard  and  sage 
Deemed  once  the  world's  immortal  gain 
Lost  from  Time's  ark,  leaves  no  more  mark 
Than  Conkling,  Cameron,  or  Elaine." 

It  was  in  the  late  summer  and  early  fall  of  1876, 
also,  when  the  political  fight  was  hottest,  that 
Lowell  peppered  the  enemy  with  the  half-dozen 
epigrams  of  which  he  preserved  only  one,  "  A  Mis 
conception."  The  allusions  in  some  were  to  passing- 
incidents,  so  that  footnotes  to  his  two-line  epigrams 
would  now  be  needed.  Some  with  good  memory 
will  need  no  key  to  unlock  this  :  — 


206  JAMES   RUSSELL   LOWELL 

THE  WIDOW'S  MITE. 

Where  currency  's  debased,  all  coins  will  pass. 
Ask  you  for  proof  ?     The  Widow's  might  is  brass. 

But  the  most  definite  public  expression  of  his 
political  thought  at  this  time  may  be  found  in  the 
draft  of  a  speech  at  a  caucus  in  Cambridge  which 
Lowell  preserved  among  his  papers.  Apparently 
Lowell  wrote  this  out  in  advance,  but  it  is  not 
likely  that  he  imported  into  a  political  caucus  the 
very  academic  method  of  reading  a  speech. 

"  I  do  not  propose,"  he  says,  "  to  make  a  speech. 
Still  less  shall  I  try  to  captivate  your  ears  or  win 
your  applauses  by  any  of  those  appeals  to  passion 
and  prejudice  which  are  so  tempting  and  so  unwise. 
Politics  are  the  most  serious  of  all  human  affairs, 
and  I  prefer  the  approval  of  your  understandings 
to  that  of  your  hands  and  feet. 

"  The  presidential  contest  of  this  year  is  in  some 
respects  unlike  any  other  that  I  remember.  Both 
parties  claim  to  be  in  favor  of  the  same  reforms  in 
our  currency  and  our  civil  service,  and  both  have 
nominated  men  of  character  and  ability  for  the 
highest  office  in  our  government.  Meanwhile  there 
is  a  much  larger  class  of  voters  than  usual  who  are 
resolved  to  cast  their  ballots  less  in  reference  to 
party  ties  than  to  what  in  their  judgment  is  the 
interest  of  the  whole  country.  The  two  parties 
are  so  evenly  balanced  that  the  action  of  this  class 
is  of  supreme  importance.  Among  these  are  doubt 
less  some  wrongheaded  men,  some  disappointed 
ones,  and  some  who  think  that  any  change,  no  mat- 


POLITICS  207 

ter  what,  may  be  for  the  better  and  cannot  be  for 
the  worse.  But  in  general  these  dissatisfied  per 
sons  are  men  of  more  than  average  thoughtfulness, 
weight  of  character,  and  influence.  They  feel  pro 
foundly  that  the  great  weakness  of  the  democratical 
form  of  government,  as  they  have  studied  its  work 
ings  in  this  country,  is  a  great  and  growing  want 
of  responsibility  in  officials,  whether  to  the  head 
of  the  government  or  to  the  country,  a  great  and 
growing  indifference  (in  the  selection  of  candi 
dates)  to  the  claims  of  character  as  compared  with 
those  of  partisan  efficiency  or  unscrupulousness. 
We  hear,  to  be  sure,  of  responsibility  to  the  Peo 
ple,  but  in  practice  this  amounts  to  very  little. 
Just  before  election  the  politicians  become  tenderly 
aware  of  the  existence  of  the  People,  they  recog 
nize  their  long  lost  brother,  and  rush  into  his  arms 
with  more  than  fraternal  fervor.  In  the  same  way, 
just  before  the  17th  of  March  they  show  a  surpris 
ing  familiarity  with  the  history  of  St.  Patrick, 
though  at  other  times  we  should  hardly  suspect 
that  their  favorite  study  was  the  lives  of  the  saints. 
During  the  rest  of  the  year  the  people  are  busy 
about  their  own  affairs,  and  have  neither  the  lei 
sure  nor  the  inclination  to  be  scrutinizing  the  con 
duct  of  their  public  servants.  A  responsibility  to 
many  is  practically  a  responsibility  to  none.  Now 
you  all  know  that  in  battling  with  the  canker- 
worm,  it  is  around  the  stem  of  the  tree  that  we 
apply  our  preventives,  because  that  is  the  high 
way  by  which  the  grubs  climb  to  lay  their  eggs. 
The  eggs  once  laid  there  is  no  remedy.  The  stem 


208  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

by  which  our  political  grubs  have  gone  up  to  de 
posit  the  germs  of  devastation  has  been  our  pri 
mary  meetings  and  conventions,  the  adroit  manage 
ment  of  which  has  too  often  given  us  candidates 
without  that  self-respect  which  makes  men  re 
sponsible  to  their  own  conscience,  and  without  that 
respect  for  the  better  sentiment  of  the  country 
which  might  spring  from  the  fear  of  lost  repute 
and  diminished  consideration.  They  fear  no  loss 
of  what  they  never  had.  The  discontented  class 
of  which  I  have  spoken  are  resolved  to  make  can 
didates  feel  their  responsibility  at  the  polls,  the 
only  point  at  which  they  are  sensitive.  I  confess 
that  I  share  largely  in  the  feeling  that  leads  them 
to  this  determination. 

"I  am  and  have  been  in  sympathy  with  the 
principles  of  the  Republican  party  as  I  understand 
them,  but  it  has  no  sacredness  for  me  when  it  de 
generates  into  a  contrivance  for  putting  unfit  men 
or  tainted  men  into  office,  and  for  making  them 
'  Honorable '  by  courtesy  who  are  not  so  by  char 
acter.  When  a  party  becomes  an  organization  to 
serve  only  its  own  private  ends,  when  it  becomes  a 
mere  means  of  livelihood  or  distinction  on  easier 
terms  than  God  for  our  good  has  prescribed,  it  has 
become  noxious  instead  of  useful.  Now,  fellow- 
citizens,  it  cannot  be  denied  that  the  Republican 
party  has  suffered  by  too  long  and  too  easy  a 
tenure  of  office.  We  ought  to  be  thankful  to  its 
opponents  for  the  investigations  which  have  shown 
us  its  weak  points.  Let  it  never  be  said  that  we 
object  to  any  investigation  of  character.  Let  it 


POLITICS  209 

always  be  said  that  we  object  to  men  who  need  or 
fear  to  be  investigated. 

"  It  will  not  do  to  appeal  to  the  past  history  and 
achievements  of  the  party.  The  greatest  of  poets 
and  one  of  the  wisest  of  men  has  said  that  — 

'  to  have  done  is  to  hang1 
Quite  out  of  fashion,  like  a  rusty  mail 
In  monumental  mockery.' 

It  is  by  their  estimate  of  the  chances  of  what 
the  party  will  do  that  independent  voters  will  be 
guided  in  their  action.  It  is  of  no  use  to  tell  them 
what  it  used  to  be,  nor,  when  they  resent  its  cor 
ruption,  to  say  that  things  were  as  bad  a  hundred 
years  ago.  We  had  hoped  the  world  was  growing 
better.  We  would  rather  not  need  to  be  consoled 
than  to  have  the  finest  consolation  that  was  ever 
manufactured  out  of  the  commonplaces  of  history. 
At  least  I  had  hoped  that  we  should  never  hear  of 
poor  old  Judas  again,  whose  conduct,  if  it  be  an 
argument  for  anything,  would  go  to  prove  that  one 
man  in  every  twelve  must  be  a  knave.  When  our 
knaves  follow  the  example  of  Judas  by  going 
straightway  and  hanging  themselves,  I  shall  not 
object  to  the  recalling  of  his  example  from  time  to 
time.  What  we  have  to  do  is  to  purify  the  party 
ourselves,  and  this  we  can  do  only  by  insisting  that 
the  men  who  are  offered  for  our  choice  shall  be 
men  of  a  character  so  well  established  that  they  are 
above  suspicion  and  incapable  of  temptation,  at 
least  in  its  baser  forms  ;  we  must  insist  on  having 
such  men,  or  acknowledge  that  our  system  of  popu 
lar  government  has  left  us  none  such. 


210  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

"It  is  said  that  the  Republican  party  cannot  be 
reformed  from  within.  This  may  or  may  not  be 
so,  but  is  this  less  true  of  the  Democratic  party  ? 
The  first  printed  ballot  I  ever  saw  was  in  Balti 
more  just  fifty  years  ago,  and  I  remember  that  it 
had  upon  it  an  American  flag  and  '  Hurrah  for 
Old  Hickory  ! '  That  «  Hurrah  for  Old  Hickory ' 
introduced  into  our  civil  service  that  evil  system 
which  has  led  to  all  the  corruption  in  our  adminis 
tration,  and  which,  if  not  cured,  will  lead  to  the 
failure  of  our  democratical  experiment.  Many 
people  seem  to  think  that  some  such  divinity  doth 
hedge  a  Democracy  as  was  once  supposed  to  hedge  a 
king.  But  perpetual  motion  is  as  idle  a  dream  in 
political  organization  as  in  mechanics.  It  is  in  the 
little  wheels,  in  those  least  obvious  to  inspection, 
that  the  derangement  is  likely  to  begin.  Are  we 
to  expect  more  vigilance  from  what  used  to  be 
called  the  Jacksonian  Democracy?  I  must  be 
allowed  to  doubt  it. 

"  But  suppose  that  I  am  mistaken,  suppose  that 
the  pretensions  of  the  two  parties  as  to  their  zeal 
for  reforms  in  the  Civil  Service  are  entitled  to 
equal  weight,  there  are  othqr  questions  to  which 
the  answer  is  by  no  means  clear.  How  is  it  about 
honest  money  ?  about  an  unmercurial  currency 
that  shall  not  rise  and  fall  with  the  temperature  of 
Wall  Street,  that  shall  neither  tempt  the  would-be 
rich  to  unsafe  speculation  nor  cheat  the  poor  of 
their  earnings  ?  Though  neither  party  has  been  so 
explicit  as  I  should  think  it  wise  to  be,  yet  I  believe 
our  chance  is  on  the  whole  better  with  the  Repub 
licans  than  with  their  opponents. 


POLITICS  211 

"  But  there  is  one  other  argument  which  with 
me  is  conclusive.  Nothing,  in  my  opinion,  is  more 
unstatesmanlike,  nothing  more  unwise  than  to  re 
vive  sectional  animosities  for  political  purposes. 
Such  expedients,  though  used  for  temporary  effect, 
are  lasting  in  their  disastrous  consequences.  But 
scarcely  less  disastrous  would  be  the  fallacious 
hopes  raised  in  the  South  by  the  success  of  Mr. 
Tilden.  We  are  not  willing  to  risk  any  of  the 
results  of  the  nation's  victory.  One  of  the  most 
important  of  those  results  was  the  assertion  of  our 
indivisible  nationality.  Mr.  Tilden  and  the  party 
which  he  directs  have  always  been  extreme  in  their 
interpretation  of  the  reserved  rights  of  the  indi 
vidual  States,  going  so  far  even  as  to  include  that 
of  rebellion  among  them.  Should  such  principles 
prevail,  revolution  would  become  constitutional, 
and  we  should  have  another  Mexico  instead  of  the 
country  we  love.  We  should  be  admitting  that 
the  war,  so  costly  to  our  prosperity,  so  incalculably 
dear  in  hopeful  lives,  was  both  a  blunder  and  a 
crime.  I  for  one  am  not  ready  for  an  admission 
like  this.  I  prefer  to  feel  myself  the  citizen  of  a 
strong  country,  to  feel  in  my  veins  the  pulses  of 
an  invincible  nationality,  whereof  I  am  a  member. 
An  indissoluble  union  is  the  chain  that  holds  us  to 
our  anchor.  Its  disjointed  links  would  be  old  iron 
for  the  junkshop." 

This  is  not  what  one  looks  for  in  a  speech  at  a 
party  caucus.  Neither  the  independence  of  the 
speaker's  attitude  nor  his  moderate  adhesion  to  the 
party  in  which  he  enrolls  himself  are  very  effective 


212  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

instruments,  and  it  is  clear  that  despite  Lowell's 
sympathy  with  the  plain  man  and  his  intimate  ac 
quaintance  with  him  as  illustrated  in  his  "  Biglow 
Papers,"  he  was  embarrassed  when  he  came  to 
speak  to  him  in  the  collectivity  of  a  public  meet 
ing,  and  scarcely  let  his  natural  voice  even  be 
heard.  Much  must  be  referred,  it  is  true,  to  his 
inexperience  with  speaking  at  public  meetings  — 
he  was  not  a  speaker  in  the  old  anti-slavery  days, 
but  his  inexperience  was  due  largely  to  his  fas 
tidiousness  of  temper  which  made  him  after  all  in 
literature  rather  than  in  life  pleased  with  the 
vision  of 

"  The  backwoods  Charlemagne  of  empires  new." 

He  found  his  own  voice  more  surely  in  his  study 
than  on  the  rostrum,  and  it  is  to  his  Fourth  of 
July  Ode  in  this  centennial  year  that  we  must  look 
for  the  most  comprehensive  and  most  natural  ex 
pression  of  his  political  sentiment.  In  poetry  he 
found  it  easiest  to  reiterate  that  faith  which  he 
had  in  an  elemental  America,  as  it  were,  a  faith 
which  was  derived  from  a  belief  in  God,  and  that 

"  Life's  bases  rest 
Beyond  the  probe  of  chemic  test ;  " 

but  he  refuses  for  all  that  to  take  refuge  in  a  mere 
blind  confidence,  admitting  a  little  ruefully  that  the 
flight  of  years  had  won  him 

"  this  unwelcome  right 
To  see  things  as  they  are,  or  shall  be  soon, 
In  the  frank  prose  of  undissembling  noon  !  " 

The  democratic  principle,  too,  which  he  held  so 
stoutly  comes  to  him  now  as  the  manifestation  of 


POLITICS  213 

human  life  concretely  apprehended  rather  than 
theoretically  conceived,  and  the  development  of  his 
own  maturer  judgment  appears  in  this  resolution 
to  find  the  base  of  national  life  in  the  men  who 
built  the  nation,  and  not  in  the  mere  speculation 
of  freedom  and  democracy. 

Lowell  published  the  three  odes  called  out  by 
the  centennial  celebrations  in  a  little  volume  enti 
tled  "  Three  Memorial  Poems,"  which  he  inscribed 
to  Mr.  Godkin  "  in  cordial  acknowledgment  of  his 
eminent  service  in  heightening  and  purifying  the 
tone  of  our  political  thought."  At  the  request  of 
his  publishers  he  was  also  assembling  his  poems  for 
a  new  and  so  far  complete  collection  in  what  was 
to  be  known  as  the  Household  Edition.  Perhaps 
the  title  was  in  his  mind  when  he  wrote  in  the  fall 
to  a  correspondent  who  had  expressed  his  apprecia 
tion,  "  I  would  rather  be  a  fireside  friend  and  the 
Galeotto  of  household  love  than  anything  else.  I 
was  especially  pleased  that  you  had  found  out  how 
much  better  the  second  series  of  the  Biglow  is  than 
the  first.  I  had  not  seen  them  for  years  when  I 
had  to  read  them  through  for  a  new  edition  this 
summer,  and  I  found  them  entertaining." 

In  February,  1877,  Lowell  went  to  Baltimore  to, 
give  before  the  Johns  Hopkins  University  a  course 
of  twenty  lectures  on  the  literature  of  the  Ro 
mance  Languages  during  the  thirteenth  and  four 
teenth  centuries,  with  Dante  as  a  central  theme. 
His  companion  was  his  friend  and  colleague  Pro 
fessor  Francis  J.  Child,  who  at  the  same  time  was 
discoursing  on  Chaucer.  The  tenth  anniversary  of 


214  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  founding  of  the  University  was  observed  during 
their  stay,  and  both  men  were  the  recipients  of 
delightful  hospitality,  while  by  their  lectures  and 
readings  and  social  gifts  they  made  themselves 
most  welcome  guests.  "  J.  L.'s  good  looks  and 
insinuating  ways,"  wrote  Mr.  Child,  "  carry  off 
the  palm  entirely  from  my  genius  and  learning, 
but  then  I  am  as  much  fascinated  as  anybody,  and 
don't  mind."  "  Child  goes  on  winning  all  ears 
and  hearts,"  wrote  Lowell.  "  I  am  rejoiced  to 
have  this  chance  of  seeing  so  much  of  him,  for 
though  I  loved  him  before,  I  did  not  know  how 
lovable  he  was  till  this  intimacy."  A  year  later, 
Lowell  writing  to  Child  from  Europe  recalls  the 
month  as  one  of  the  pleasantest  of  his  life.  Low 
ell  stayed  with  his  kinsman  Mr.  Spence,  but  he 
found  a  frequent  respite  from  the  gayety  in  which 
he  was  involved  in  a  quiet  luncheon  with  his 
friend  Mrs.  Herrick,  who  tactfully  forebore  to 
make  her  luncheons  additions  to  the  social  func 
tions  which  excited  but  wearied  as  well. 

A  souvenir  of  the  enjoyment  Lowell  had  in  his 
visit  to  Baltimore  is  in  a  sonnet  which  he  wrote  to 
a  young  daughter  of  President  Gilman  of  the  uni 
versity.  "  I  shall  assume,"  he  wrote  her  from 
Elmwood,  7  April,  1877,  "  for  my  own  convenience 
that  there  were  just  fourteen  roses  in  the  lovely 
sheaf  I  found  in  my  room  when  I  came  in  for 
shelter  from  the  ill-humor  of  that  February  day,  so 
unlike  the  temperature,  both  outward  and  inward, 
to  which  Baltimore  had  accustomed  us.  I  repay 
them  in  fourteen  verses,  and  I  wish  it  were  as  easy 


POLITICS  215 

to  match  the  sweetness  of  your  sonnet  as  its  num 
bers.  However,  I  promised  you  that  I  would  send 
it  and  have  not  forgotten,  but  have  had  so  many 
things  to  do  that  I  have  delayed  paying  my  debt 
till  you  have  half  forgotten  your  debtor.  The  two 
quatrains  with  which  my  sonnet  gets  well  under 
way  were  written  on  the  spot  with  your  roses  com 
forting  two  of  my  benumbed  senses.  Luckily  I 
wrote  them  on  the  back  of  an  invitation  which 
certifies  to  the  date  —  c  Saturday,  24  February.' 
The  concluding  triplets  I  had  partly  writtjy|  down 
when  I  was  interrupted,  and  I  finished  tlmn  this 
morning.  I  wish  it  were  better,  but  at  least  the 
gratitude  will  last,  if  not  the  sonnet." 

TO  MISS  ALICE  GILMAN, 

WHO    SENT   ME   ROSES,    24TH   FEBY.,  1877. 

A  handful  of  ripe  rosebuds  in  my  room 
I  found  Avhen  all  heaven's  mercy  seemed  shut  out 
By  clouds  morose  that  dallied  with  a  doubt 
,  'Tween  rain  and  snow  :  meanwhile  mine  eyes  with  bloom 
Were  comforted,  and  over  Summer's  tomb, 
Out  of  your  gift  rose  nightingales  to  flout 
With  Easter  prophecies  the  chill  without 
yAnd  sing  the  mind  clear  of  the  season's  gloom. 
So  may  your  innocent  fancy  be  carest 
Ever  with  impulses  to  timely  deeds 
generous  of  sunshine,  and  your  life  be  blest 
'With  flower  and  fruit  immortal,  sprung  of  seeds 
Sown  by  those  singing  birds  that  make  their  nest 
In  natures  thoughtful  of  another's  needs ! 

Wot  long  after  Lowell's  return  from  Baltimore 
rumors  began  to  fly  about  that  he  was  to  have  a  for 
eign  mission.  Mr.  Longfellow  notes  in  his  diary, 


216  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

7  April,  1877  :  "In  the  afternoon  Charles  Norton 
called.  We  talked  of  Ruskin  and  Carlyle,  and  of 
Lowell's  having  the  English  mission."  It  was  not 
unnatural  that  public  attention  should  be  called  to 
him  in  connection  with  some  diplomatic  post,  in 
view  of  the  somewhat  peculiar  circumstances  con 
nected  with  his  relations  to  the  recent  presidential 
election.  He  was  one  of  the  electors  in  Massa 
chusetts  upon  the  Republican  ballot,  and  when 
the  issue  of  the  election  was  in  doubt  and  many 
believed  that  Mr.  Tilden  was  the  actual  choice 
though  Mr.  Hayes  was  nominally  chosen,  there 
were  voices  that  called  on  Lowell  to  use  his  tech 
nical  right  and  cast  his  vote  for  Mr.  Tilden.  It 
was  a  curious  comment  on  affairs.  It  implied  on 
the  part  of  those  who  proposed  it  a  confidence  that 
Lowell  was  independent  enough  to  use  this  right. 
I  am  not  sure  that  any  other  elector  was  named 
who  might  be  expected  to  take  this  responsibility. 
On  the  other  hand,  those  who  urged  this  course 
seem  to  have  been  blind  to  the  enormous  violation 
of  faith  involved  in  such  a  course.  The  machinery 
of  the  electoral  system,  however  it  had  been  de 
signed  at  first,  had  gradually  and  immutably  be 
come  a  mere  device  for  the  registry  of  the  popular 
choice  ;  all  initiative  on  the  part  of  the  electors  was 
totally  cancelled.  Lowell  himself  never  had  any 
hesitation.  As  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Leslie  Stephen  : 
"  In  my  own  judgment  I  have  no  choice,  and  am 
bound  in  honor  to  vote  for  Hayes,  as  the  people 
who  chose  me  expected  me  to  do.  They  did  not 
choose  me  because  they  had  confidence  in  my  judg- 


POLITICS  217 

ment,  but  because  they  thought  they  knew  what 
that  judgment  would  be.  If  I  had  told  them  that 
I  should  vote  for  Tilden,  they  would  never  have 
nominated  me.  It  is  a  plain  question  of  trust. 
The  provoking  part  of  it  is  that  I  tried  to  escape 
nomination  all  I  could,  and  only  did  not  decline 
because  I  thought  it  would  be  making  too  much 
fuss  over  a  trifle." 

The  actual  facts  of  the  appointment  of  Lowell 
to  the  Spanish  mission  have  been  so  explicitly  told 
by  Mr.  Howells,  who  had  a  grateful  part  to  play 
in  the  transaction,  that  with  his  permission  I  copy 
his  account  of  it.  "I  do  not  know  whether  it 
crossed  his  mind  after  the  election  of  Hayes  that 
he  might  be  offered  some  place  abroad,  but  it  cer 
tainly  crossed  the  minds  of  some  of  his  friends,  and 
I  could  not  feel  that  I  was  acting  for  myself  alone 
when  I  used  a  family  connection  with  the  Presi 
dent,  very  early  in  his  term,  to  let  him  know  that 
I  believed  Lowell  would  accept  a  diplomatic  mis 
sion.  I  could  assure  him  that  I  was  writing  wholly 
without  Lowell's  privity  or  authority,  and  I  got 
back  such  a  letter  as  I  could  wish  in  its  delicate 
sense  of  the  situation.  The  President  said  that 
he  had  already  thought  of  offering  Lowell  some 
thing,  and  he  gave  me  the  pleasure,  a  pleasure  be 
yond  any  other  I  could  imagine,  of  asking  Lowell 
whether  he  would  accept  the  mission  to  Austria. 
I  lost  no  time  in  carrying  his  letter  to  Elmwood, 
where  I  found  Lowell  over  his  coffee  at  dinner. 
He  saw  me  at  the  threshold,  and  called  to  me 
through  the  open  door  to  come  in,  and  I  handed 


218  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

him  the  letter,  and  sat  down  at  table  while  he  ran 
it  through.  When  he  had  read  it,  he  gave  a  quick 
^  Ah ! '  and  threw  it  over  the  length  of  the  table  to 
Mrs.  Lowell.  She  read  it  in  a  smiling  and  loyal 
reticence,  as  if  she  would  not  say  one  word  of  all 
she  might  wish  to  say  in  urging  his  acceptance, 
though  I  could  see  that  she  was  intensely  eager  for 
it.  The  whole  situation  was  of  a  perfect  New 
England  character  in  its  tacit  significance  ;  after 
Lowell  had  taken  his  coffee,  we  turned  into  his 
study,  without  further  allusion  to  the  matter. 

"  A  day  or  two  later  he  came  to  my  house  to  say 
that  he  could  not  accept  the  Austrian  mission,  and 
to  ask  me  to  tell  the  President  so  for  him  and 
make  his  acknowledgments,  which  he  would  also 
write  himself.  He  remained  talking  a  little  while  of 
other  things,  and  when  he  rose  to  go  he  said,  with 
a  sigh  of  vague  reluctance,  '  I  should  like  to  see  a 
play  of  Calderon,'  as  if  it  had  nothing  to  do  with 
any  wish  of  his  that  could  still  be  fulfilled.  '  Upon 
this  hint  I  acted,'  and  in  due  time  it  was  found  in 
Washington  that  the  gentleman  who  had  been 
offered  the  Spanish  mission  would  as  lief  go  to 
Austria,  and  Lowell  was  sent  to  Madrid." a  In  a 
letter  to  his  daughter  2  Lowell  says  further  that  he 
had  also  the  choice  of  going  to  Berlin. 

Mr.  Evarts,  the  Secretary  of  State,  was  in  Bos 
ton  at  this  time,  and  in  a  personal  conference  the 
preliminary  arrangement  appears  to  have  been 

made.     Mr.  Hayes  also  came  to  Boston  in  June, 

i 

1  Literary  Friends  and  Acquaintances,  pp.  237,  238. 

2  Elmwood,  5  June,  1877.     Letters,  ii.  194. 


POLITICS  219 

and  Lowell  met  him  and  his  wife,  and  has  left  a  re 
cord  of  the  impression  they  produced  upon  him,  in 
one  of  his  letters  written  shortly  afterward.1  The 
anticipation  of  this  n£5^chapier  in  his  life  seems  to 
have  given  him  a  divided  feeling.  The  honor  of 
the  place  half  amused  and  half  pleased  him.  With 
the  ingenuous  pride  of  a  college  man,  he  thought 
how  his  name  would  look  in  capitals  in  the  college 
triennial,  and  wished  his  father,  who  had  a  high 
sense  of  that  dignity,  could  have  enjoyed  the  sight. 
He  was  too  fixed  in  his  position  before  the  world 
to  be  over-elated  at  the  conspicuousness  which  the 
place  brought  him,  and  he  disliked  publicity  so 
much  that  that  side  of  the  business  filled  him  with 
a  sort  of  dismay.  He  welcomed  the  opportunity 
for  enlarging  his  Spanish  studies,  and  he  had  an 
honest  desire  to  represent  his  country  well.  "  I 
believe,"  he  wrote  to  his  friend  Thomas  Hughes, 
"  that  I  can  live  my  own  life  (part  of  the  time,  at 
least)  in  Madrid,  and  need  not  have  any  more 
flummery  than  I  choose.  What  unsettled  me  first 
was  that  a  good  many  people  wished  to  see  me 
sent  to  London,  and  I  was  persuaded  that  I  might 
be  of  some  service  there  by  not  living  like  a  Duke, 
and  in  promoting  a  better  understanding  between 
the  two  countries.  But  my  friends  were  mistaken 
in  supposing  that  I  had  been  thought  of  for  Eng 
land.  .  .  .  Things  are  going  more  to  my  mind 
now,  and  President  Hayes  made  a  most  agreeable 
impression  on  me  when  he  was  here  the  other  day. 
He  struck  me  as  simple,  honest,  and  full  of  good 
1  To  Miss  Grace  Norton.  Letters,  ii.  195,  196. 


220  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

feeling,  a  very  good  American  to  my  thinking. 
.  .  .  By  all  means  come  to  Madrid.  I  shall  have 
a  house  there,  and  a  spare  bed  in  it  always.  It 
would  be  delightful  to  take  you  a  drive  to  the 
Prado  in  my  own  (hired)  ambassadorial  coach. 
My  '  Excellency '  will  give  me  cause  for  much  seri 
ous  meditation." 

It  must  not  be  supposed,  however,  that  the 
prospect  was  untouched  with  doubt.  "  I  am  by  no 
means  sure,"  Lowell  writes  to  Mr.  Reverdy  John 
son  of  Baltimore,  shortly  after  accepting  the  post, 
"  that  I  did  wisely  in  accepting  the  Spanish  mis 
sion.  I  really  did  not  wish  to  go  abroad  at  all, 
but  my  friends  have  been  urgent  (Godkin  among 
them),  and  I  go." 

Mr.  and  Mrs.  Lowell  sailed  for  Liverpool  on  the 
Parthia  from  Boston,  Saturday,  14  July,  1877. 
The  agent  of  the  steamship  company  followed  cus 
tom  in  making  special  provisions  for  the  send-off 
of  a  public  man,  and  a  comment  on  Lowell's  inca 
pability  of  filling  the  role  in  every  respect  may  be 
read  in  his  good-by  note  to  his  friend  Mr.  Norton, 
who  had  received  one  of  the  agent's  invitations: 
"  You  will  laugh  to-morrow,  I  hope,  when  you  think 
of  me  going  down  the  harbor  with  the  revenue 
cutter  and  a  steam  tug  to  bring  back  those  who 
can't  part  with  me  this  side  the  outer  light.  If  the 
agent  of  the  Cunard  line  had  given  a  month's 
meditation  to  devising  what  would  annoy  me  most, 
be  could  have  hit  on  nothing  to  beat  this.  When 
I  got  his  note  yesterday  morning,  I  positively  burst 
forth  into  a  cold  sweat.  But  Sunday  will  bring 
peace."  .  .  . 


CHAPTER   XIV 

THE   SPANISH   MISSION 

1877-1880 

THE  preparation  which  Lowell  had  received  for 
efficient  service  as  Minister  of  the  United  States  to 
Spain  certainly  did  not  lie  in  the  discharge  of  so- 
called  political  duties.  To  be  delegate  to  a  district 
convention  and  presidential  elector  would  scarcely 
qualify  one  for  a  diplomatic  post,  and  to  many  of 
his  countrymen  no  doubt  he  seemed  but  a  dilettante 
statesman.  Yet  he  was  better  trained  than  many 
a  man  who  has  been  more  energetic  in  party  organ 
ization.  He  was  a  fair  Spanish  scholar  so  far  as 
familiarity  with  the  literature  goes.  When  he  first 
entered  on  his  duties  he  was,  it  is  true,  depressed 
by  his  inability  to  use  the  language  freely;  his 
pride  was  mortified  with  the  ease  with  which  others 
could  use  it,  and  both  his  French,  of  such  use  in 
diplomacy,  and  his  Italian  got  in  his  way.  But  a 
couple  of  months  after  he  had  reached  his  post  he 
could  say :  "I  can  talk  now  with  comparative  ease 
and  write  notes  without  fear  of  scandal.  What  I 
wanted  was  the  familiar  and  every-day  forms.  I 
am  getting  them.  But  all  along  I  have  insisted 
on  conducting  my  official  business  in  Spanish,  and 
have  already  astonished  'em  at  the  Foreign  Office 


222  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

here.  They  say  in  their  Oriental  way  that  I  speak 
Castilian  like  a  native  and  pronounce  it  perfectly. 
Of  course  I  have  n't  turned  goose  since  I  came,  to 
believe  all  this,  but  I  really  am  getting  on." 

But  if  colloquial  Spanish  was  not  at  first  at  his 
command,  he  had  a  very  valuable  instrument  in 
his  familiarity  with  Spanish  literature.  The  man 
who  knows  and  loves  the  best  literature  of  the 
country  to  which  he  is  accredited  has  the  key 
wherewith  to  unlock  the  nature  of  the  men  with 
whom  he  has  to  deal.  Lowell,  to  whom  Calderon\N 
was  as  a  nightingale  in  his  study,  was  not  taken 
unawares  when  asked  to  go  to  Spain.  He  did  not 
need  to  cram  for  an  examination.  When  qualify 
ing  himself  for  his  post  at  Harvard,  twenty  years 
'before,  he  had  made  himself  acquainted  with  Span 
ish,  and  both  his  studies  and  his  teaching  since 
that  day  had  led  him  into  such  an  acquaintance 
with  its  language,  literature,  and  history,  that  he 
i  could  say  playfully  that  he  knew  more  Spanish 
(than  most  Spaniards. 

At  first  sight  it  might  seem  that  the  somewhat 
isolated  and  secluded  life  he  had  led  would  have 
disqualified  Lowell  for  the  life  of  a  diplomat ;  that 
greater  commerce  with  men  was  essential  to  the 
training  of  one  whose  business  it  was  to  deal  di 
rectly  with  men  in  matters  possibly  of  high  conse 
quences.  But  if  Lowell  was  a  scholar  and  some 
what  of  a  recluse,  it  must  be  remembered  that  his 
most  frequent  converse  was  with  picked  men,  and 
that,  moreover,  in  his  studies  and  reading  his  atten 
tion  had  been  concentrated  on  literature  which  was 


THE  SPANISH   MISSION  223 

expressive  of  great  thoughts,  great  emotions,  and 
great  dramatic  situations,  so  that  both  in  life  and 
in  literature  he  was  at  home  and  moved  with  ease 
in  high  society. 

In  diplomatic  life,  the  minister  can  scarcely 
escape  the  consciousness  of  his  representative  char 
acter.  The  men  with  whom  he  has  most  to  do 
remind  him  of  it ;  they  are  themselves  in  the  same 
category.  The  reader  of  Shakespeare's  Histories 
is  struck  with  the  fine  impersonation  of  their  coun 
tries  which  the  leading  characters  convey  as  it 
were  in  the  tones  of  their  voice.  France,  England, 
Scotland  become  in  their  impassioned  language  not 
geographical  entities,  nor  even  nations  merely,  but 
incarnate  in  them.  So  at  courts,  aided  by  the 
very  trappings  and  ceremonies  of  their  office,  pri 
vate  gentlemen  become  for  the  nonce  figures  in  a 
pageant  and  feel  themselves  such.  They  speak,  it 
may  be,  in  their  natural  voice,  and  talk  for  the 
most  part  with  ministers  of  state  as  man  to  man, 
with  friendly  accent  and  in  neglige  forms  even ; 
but  the  consciousness  of  their  representative  func 
tion  is  never  remote,  it  is  always  alert  and  ready 
against  surprise.  I  suspect  it  becomes  even  more 
\  easy  for  a  scholar  than  for  a  man  of  affairs  to  play/ 
the  part  well  on  such  a  stage.  And  it  is  this  same 
sense  which  lies  behind  much  of  the  sensitiveness 
as  to  rank  and  punctilio.  The  ambassador  takes 
precedence  of  the  minister ;  thus  the  minister  of 
a  great  country  is  irritated  at  finding  himself  in 
the  procession  behind  the  ambassador  of  a  country 
of  a  second  order,  not  because  his  personal  pride 


224  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

is  wounded,  but  because  his  country  has  felt  a 
slight.  These  things  touch  a  man  of  the  great 
world  more  than  a  mere  man  of  the  world.  The 
scholar  who  is  absolutely  content  with  high  think 
ing  and  plain  living  in  his  own  home  may  be  ab 
normally  sensitive  to  appearances  in  the  embassy 
over  which  he  presides.  It  is  an  illustration  of 
this  that  when  at  his  presentation  to  the  King  there 
was  some  blunder,  and  .Lowell  was  kept  waiting 
twenty  minutes  beyond  the  hour  appointed  for  his 
audience,  and  the  introducer  apologized,  Lowell 
replied  it  was  nothing  to  him  personally,  but  it 
should  be  remembered  it  was  not  he,  but  the  United 
States  that  was  kept  waiting. 

Another  illustration  appears  in  the  despatch 
which  Lowell  sent  Mr.  Evarts,  3  February,  1878, 
detailing  the  course  he  pursued  when  he  received 
a  telegram  from  the  President  congratulating  the 
King  upon  his  approaching  marriage.  "  I  com 
municated  the  substance  of  it,"  he  writes,  "  to  the 
Minister  of  State  and  asked  for  an  audience  that 
I  might  present  it  in  person  to  His  Majesty.  On 
Monday  (the  21st  ultimo),  accordingly,  I  was  re 
ceived  by  King  Alfonso  in  private  audience  and 
delivered  my  message,  at  the  same  time  adding  that 
it  gave  me  particular  pleasure  to  be  the  bearer  of 
it.  The  King  in  reply  desired  me  to  convey  to  the 
President  his  great  pleasure  in  receiving  this  ex 
pression  of  sympathy  from  the  chief  magistrate  of 
a  people  with  which  he  wished  always  to  maintain 
and  draw  closer  the  most  friendly  relations.  A 
very  gracefully  timed  compliment  to  the  messenger 
followed.  .  . 


THE   SPANISH  MISSION  225 

"  I  think  that  this  act  of  courtesy  on  the  part  of 
the  President  has  really  given  pleasure  here,  and 
has  not  been  entirely  lost  in  the  throng  of  special 
ambassadors  who  have  been  despatched  hither  with 
numerous  suites  to  pay  the  royal  compliments  of 
the  occasion.  *r  § 

"  As  these  special  ambassadors  had  been  re 
ceived  in  public  audience,  I  had  some  doubt 
whether  I  ought  to  consent,  as  being  in  this  case 
the  immediate  representative  of  the  President,  to 
be  received  privately.  But  the  time  was  too  short 
for  much  consideration.  The  audience  was  to  be 
at  half-past  one  o'clock,  and  I  received  notice  of  it 
only  the  night  before.  Had  it  been  a  letter  of  the 
President,  I  should  have  insisted  on  its  being  re 
ceived  publicly.  As  it  was,  I  thought  it  most  pru 
dent  and  graceful  to  admit  the  distinction  between 
extraordinary  ambassadors  sent  with  great  pomp  to 
bring  gifts  and  decorations,  and  a  mere  minister 
plenipotentiary,  especially  as  it  would  have  other 
wise  been  impossible  to  deliver  the  message  at  all 
before  the  wedding.  The  difficulty  was  heightened 
by  my  having  only  just  risen  from  a  very  severe 
attack  of  illness,  which  made  it  necessary  for  me  to 
economize  my  strength  in  order  to  take  any  part  at 
all  in  the  ceremonies." 

To  all  this  must  surely  be  added,  thatj  liis  very 
abstinence  from  political  party  associations  at  home 
deepened  Lowell's  sense  of  his  position.  His  con 
ception  of  the  nation  which  he  represented  was 
not  embarrassed  by  the  vapors  too  often  engen 
dered  by  "  practical  politics."  He  knew  his  coun- 


226  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

try,  as  we  have  already  seen  by  an  examination 
of  his  political  writings,  and  even  when  most  full 
of  concern  for  her  integrity,  he  always  kept  before 
him  the  ideal  of  a  land  devoted  to  freedom  and 
progress.  That  he  was  an  idealist  made  him  more 
readily  an  actor  on  the  diplomatic  stage  where 
America  met  Spain  when  Lowell  conversed  with 
Silvela.  But  his  idealism  did  not  get  in  the  way 
of  his  plain  business  sense.  Rather  it  helped  him 
and  supplied  that  consciousness  of  dignity  which 
might  have  forsaken  him  had  he  regarded  himself 
merely  as  a  business  agent. 

The  drawback  to  his  satisfaction  with  the  office 
was  his  consciousness  that  he  disliked  business  and 
was  not  apt  at  it ;  and  business  after  all  was  what 
lay  constantly  beneath  all  the  courtly  exchange  of 
civility.  "  You  would  have  laughed,"  he  wrote  to 
an  intimate  friend,  "  if  you  could  have  seen  my 
anxiety  when  I  had  to  give  a  receipt  for  an  indem 
nity  of  five  hundred  thousand  dollars.  I  was  so 
afraid  of  making  a  blunder.  It  kept  me  awake 
night  after  night,  even  when  I  had  signed  it,  and 
gave  me  such  palpitations  of  the  heart  that  I  have 
had  pains  there  ever  since-.  It  was  not  myself  I 
was  thinking  of  —  but  the  guild  —  I  did  n't  wish 
another  of  those  '  d — d  littery  fellers '  to  come  to 
grief."  And  to  Mr.  Putnam  he  wrote :  "  I  like 
the  Spaniards  very  well  so  far  as  I  know  them,  and 
have  an  instinctive  sympathy  with  their  want  of 
aptitude  for  business."  Of  course  he  relied  much 
on  the  subordinate  officers  of  the  legation,  but  he 
knew  well  that  he  could  not  leave  the  business  to 


THE   SPANISH  MISSION  227 

them,  and  he  had,  besides,  for  a  while  the  interest 
in  the  details  of  a  life  which  was  novel  to  him,  as 
well  as  the  pride  which  would  not  suffer  him  to  be 
a  mere  figure-head. 

The  Lowells  were  about  a  month  on  their  way 
from  Boston  to  Madrid.  They  spent  a  few  days 
in  London,  and  Lowell  was  in  a  holiday  mood  both 
there  and  in  Paris,  where  they  also  made  a  brief 
halt  in  the  same  pleasant  inn  in  the  Latin  Quarter 
in  which  they  had  been  so  much  at  home  three 
years  before.  The  tranquil  enjoyment  of  little 
scenes  which  his  letters  from  the  two  capitals  dis 
close  betokens  a  mind  unvexed  by  many  cares. 
He  was  entering  upon  a  new  and  untried  expe 
rience,  but  he  was  too  old  to  feel  an  undue  excite 
ment,  and  too  well  poised  to  borrow  trouble  from 
ignorance  of  superficial  duties.  He  was  rid  of  the 
rather  irksome  and  too  familiar  occupations  of  the 
academic  life,  he  was  yet  in  his  freedom  to  assume 
novel  responsibilities,  and  he  set  his  face  toward 
Madrid  with  an  equanimity  which  was  no  doubt 
heightened  by  the  feeling  that  he  was  not  Professor 
Lowell  on  a  vacation,  but  Minister  Lowell  about  to 
realize  his  new  function. 

The  Lowells  reached  Madrid  on  the  fourteenth 
of  August,  and  on  the  eighteenth  of  the  month 
Lowell  was  presented  at  court,  the  King  being  at 
his  summer  residence  at  La  Gran j a,  about  fifty 
miles  from  Madrid.  He  has  given  a  brief  narra 
tive  of  the  ceremony l  which  was  his  initiation  into 

1  Letters,  ii.  200-202. 


228  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

diplomatic  life,  and,  as  we  have  seen,  he  began  at 
once  his  work  at  the  legation,  insisting  upon  using 
his  Spanish  in  all  negotiations.  But  the  first  few 
weeks  in  Madrid  were  anything  but  agreeable, 
since  besides  the  worries  of  house-hunting  he  was 
tortured  with  gout,  which  after  a  couple  of  .months 
permitted  him  to  hobble  to  the  office,  only  if  he 
put  on  large  walking  shoes  and  handled  a  crutch. 

Meantime  he  had  found  a  pleasant  apartment 
at  No.  7  Cuesta  de  Santo  Domingo,  with  a  large 
endowment  of  sunshine.  Indeed,  the  sunshine 
of  Spain  warmed  his  spirits  thoroughly.  "  The 
weather,"  he  writes,  "  is  beyond  any  I  ever  saw.  I 
got  out  on  the  balcony  this  morning,  and  there  was 
all  the  warmth  and,  what  is  more,  all  the  freshness 
and  hopefulness  of  spring."  And  to  Mr.  Long 
fellow  :  "  It  beats  Italy.  Such  limpidity  of  sky  !  " 
After  he  was  well  adjusted  in  his  new  quarters,  he 
wrote :  "  Our  household  is  truly  Complutensian. 
Our  cook  is  an  old  Alsacian  woman,  toothless  as 
one  of  Gil  Bias's  robbers.  She  speaks  French, 
German,  Spanish,  and  perhaps  Arabic,  for  she 
lived  eight  years  in  Algeria.  Our  chambermaid, 
Pepa,  is  a  brown-yellow  Spaniard  with  an  immense 
wad  of  false  hair  on  the  back  of  her  head,  like  all 
her  class  here.  My  valet  and  factotum  is  an  Ital 
ian  from  Trieste,  speaking  French,  English,  and 
Spanish.  His  wife  (Fanny's  maid)  is  a  Parisienne. 
Since  Babel  there  have  been  few  such  chances  for 
learning  the  languages.  My  man  has  four  names 
according  to  the  tongue  I  address  him  in,  Gia- 
como,  Santiago,  Jacques,  James.  With  Carolina 


THE  SPANISH  MISSION  229 

I  sometimes  jabber  a  little  German.  Our  rooms 
are  not  yet  furnished,  though  we  have  been  in  them 
seven  weeks.  Except  the  dining-room.  We  bought 
ten  old  chairs,  highbacked  and  covered  with  a 
flowered  plush,  which  oddly  enough  exactly  matched 
our  wall-paper.  They  are  handsome,  and  I  believe 
were  just  finished  when  I  bought  'em  (period 
of  Philip  II.).  However,  they  are  worm-eaten, 
which  has  a  savor  of  authenticity  about  it,  and  the 
maker  has  been  more  successful  in  reproducing  the 
past  than  Mareschal  McMahon  seems  to  be.  By 
the  time  I  get  them  home,  they  will  be  genuine 
old  Spanish  chairs  at  any  rate,  and  there  is  such  a 
thing  as  considering  too  nicely." 

His  diplomatic  duties  at  first  gave  him  some 
concern.  He  wrote  to  his  daughter,  18  November, 
1877 :  "  Mamma  has  told  you  of  my  tribulations 
with  gout  —  first  in  one  foot,  then  in  t'  other.  I 
could  not  write  any  letters  during  those  six  weeks. 
And  then  I  had  my  moral  acclimatization  to  go 
through  with,  which  is  not  by  any  means  ended 
yet.  It  was  rather  tough  at  first  —  in  a  per 
fectly  strange  country,  the  only  stranger,  as  it 
were,  for  all  my  fellow-diplomats  had  either  been 
here  some  years  or  had  experience  elsewhere ;  — 
unable  to  speak  the  language  fluently,  and  in  a 
labyrinth  of  etiquette  where,  as  in  some  old  gar 
dens,  if  you  take  a  step  in  the  wrong  direction  you 
are  deluged  with  cold  water.  Well,  philosophy  is 
an  admirable  umbrella,  but  when  we  are  caught  in 
a  sudden  shower  it 's  no  use  remembering  how  we 
left  it  standing  in  the  corner,  as  we  always  do." 


230  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Lowell  thought  himself  too  old  to  find  the  cere 
monial  parts  of  his  occupation  even  amusing. 
They  bored  him ;  but  he  had  a  gejiuj]ie_Jh]inian 
injterestjll-the  living^  part  ofjwhat  he  saw  and  fh'rL- 
It  was  for  him  like  reading  a  bit  of  history,  not 
from  books  but  from  men,  and  it  was  not  long 
before  he  had  an  opportunity  of  taking  part  in  a 
ceremony,  the  marriage  of  the  young  King ;  and  in 
the  narrative  which  he  gives  of  the  event,  as  well 
as  preliminary  comments  in  despatches  to  the  State 
Department,  13  December,  1877  —  6  February, 
1878,1  he  not  only  gives  an  agreeable  description 
of  the  affair,  but  indicates  with  some  clearness  his 
own  personal  interest  as  a  student. 

"  Nowhere  in  the  world,"  he  writes,  "  could  a 
spectacle  have  been  presented  which  recalled  so 
various,  so  far-reaching,  and,  in  some  respects,  so 
sublime  associations,  yet  rendered  depressing  by  a 
sense  of  anachronism,  of  decay,  and  of  that  unre 
ality  which  is  all  the  sadder  for  being  gorgeous. 
The  Roman  amphitheatre  (panem  et  circenses), 
the  united  escutcheons  from  whose  quartering 
dates  the  downfall  of  Saracenic  civilization  and 
dominion  in  Spain ;  the  banners  of  Lepanto  and 
of  the  Inquisition  fading  together  into  senile  ob 
livion  on  the  walls  of  the  Atocha ;  the  names  and 
titles  that  recalled  the  conquest  of  western  empires, 
or  the  long  defeat  whose  heroism  established  the 
independence  of  the  United  Provinces,  and  proved 
that  a  confederacy  of  traders  could  be  heroic  ;  the 
stage-coaches,  plumed  horses,  blazing  liveries,  and 

1  Copied  in  Impressions  of  Spain,  pp.  53-72. 


THE  SPANISH  MISSION  231 

running  footmen  of  Louis  Quatorze  ;  the  partisans 
of  Philip  III.'s  body-guard,  the  three-cornered  hats, 
white  breeches,  and  long  black  gaiters  of  a  century 
ago,  mingled  pell-mell  with  the  French  shakos  and 
red  trousers  of  to-day ;  the  gay  or  sombre  costumes 
from  every  province  of  Spain,  some  recalling  the 
Moor  and  some  the  motley  mercenaries  of  Lope  de 
Figueroa ;  the  dense  arid  mostly  silent  throng 
which  lined  for  miles  the  avenue  to  the  church, 
crowding  the  windows  with  white  mantillas,  frin 
ging  the  eaves  and  ridge-poles,  and  clustered  like 
swarming  bees  on  every  kind  of  open  ground  ;  —  all 
these  certainly  touched  the  imagination,  but,  in  my 
case  at  least,  with  a  chill  as  of  the  dead  man's 
hand  that  played  so  large  a  part  in  earlier  incan 
tations  to  recall  the  buried  or  delay  the  inevitable. 
There  was  everything  to  remind  one  of  the  past ; 
there  was  nothing  to  suggest  the  future. 

"  And  yet  I  am  unjust.  There  were  the  young 
King  and  his  bride  radiant  with  spirit  and  hope, 
rehearsing  the  idyl  which  is  charming  alike  to 
youth  and  age,  and  giving  pledges,  as  I  hope  and 
believe,  of  more  peaceful  and  prosperous  years  to 
come  for  a  country  which  has  had  too  much  glory 
and  too  little  good  housekeeping.  No  one  familiar 
with  Spanish  history,  or  who  has  even  that  super 
ficial  knowledge  of  her  national  character,  which  is 
all  that  a  foreigner  is  capable  of  acquiring,  can 
expect  any  sudden  or  immediate  regeneration. 
The  bent  of  ages  is  not  to  be  straightened  in  a  day 
by  never  so  many  liberal  constitutions,  nor  by  the 
pedantic  application  of  theories  drawn  from  for- 


232  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

eign  experience,  the  result  of  a  wholly  different 
past. 

"  If  the  ninety  years  since  the  French  Revolu 
tion  have  taught  anything,  it  is  that  institutions 
grow,  and  cannot  be  made  to  order,  —  that  they 
grow  out  of  an  actual  past,  and  are  not  to  be  con 
spired  out  of  a  conjectural  future, — that  human 
nature  is  stronger  than  any  invention  of  man. 
How  much  of  this  lesson  has  been  learned  in 
Spain,  it  is  hard  to  say  ;  but  if  the  young  King 
apply  his  really  acute  intelligence,  as  those  who 
know  him  best  believe  he  will,  to  the  conscientious 
exercise  of  constitutional  powers  and  the  steady 
development  of  parliamentary  methods,  till  party 
leaders  learnV  that  an  ounce_of_patience  is  worth  a 
pound  of  passion^,  Spain  may  at  length  count  on 
that  duration  of  tranquillity  the  want  of  which  has 
been  the  chief  obstacle  to  her  material  develop 
ment.  Looked  at  in  this  light,  the  pomps  of  the 
wedding  festival  on  the  23d  of  last  month  may  be 
something  more  than  a  mere  show.  Nor  should 
it  be  forgotten  that  here  it  is  not  the  idea  of  Law 
but  of  Power  that  is  rooted  in  the  consciousness  of 
the  people,  and  that  ceremonial  is  the  garment  of 
Authority.  .  .  . 

"  The  ceremony  over,  the  King  and  Queen,  pre 
ceded  by  the  Cabinet  Ministers,  the  special  ambas 
sadors,  and  the  grandees'of  Spain,  and  followed  by 
other  personages,  all  in  coaches  of  state,  drove  at 
a  foot-pace  to  the  Palace,  where  their  Majesties 
received  the  congratulations  of  the  Court,  and 
afterwards  passed  in  review  the  garrison  of 


THE   SPANISH  MISSION  233 

dricl.  By  invitation  of  the  President  of  the  Coun 
cil,  the  Foreign  Legations  witnessed  the  royal 
procession  from  the  balconies  of  the  Presidency. 
It  was  a  very  picturesque  spectacle,  and  yet  so 
comically  like  a  scene  from  Cinderella  as  to  have 
a  strong  flavor  of  unreality.  It  was  the  past  com 
ing  back  again,  and  thus  typified  one  of  the  chronic 
maladies  of  Spain.  There  was  no  enthusiasm, 
nothing  more  than  the  curiosity  of  idleness  which 
would  have  drawn  as  great  a  crowd  to  gape  at  the 
entry  of  a  Japanese  ambassador.  I  heard  none  of 
the  shouts  of  which  I  read  in  some  of  the  newspa 
pers  the  next  day.  No  inference,  however,  should 
be  drawn  from  this  as  to  the  popularity  or  un 
popularity  of  the  King.  The  people  of  the  capital 
have  been  promised  the  millennium  too  often,  and 
have  been  too  constantly  disappointed  to  indulge 
in  many  illusions.  Spain,  isolated  as  in  many  re 
spects  she  is,  cannot  help  suffering  in  sympathy 
with  the  commercial  depression  of  the  rest  of  the 
world,  and  Spaniards,  like  the  rest  of  mankind, 
look  to  a  change  of  ministry  for  a  change  in  the 
nature  of  things.  The  internal  policies  of  the 
country  (even  if  I  could  hope  to  understand  them, 
as  I  am  studying  to  do)  'do  not  directly  come 
within  my  province ;  but  it  is  safe  to  say  that 
Spain  is  lucky  in  having  her  ablest  recent  states 
man  at  the  head  of  affairs,1  though  at  the  cost  of 
many  other  private  ambitions.  That  he  has  to 
steer  according  to  the  prevailing  set  of  the  wind  is 
perhaps  rather  the  necessity  of  his  position  than 

1  Senor  Cdnovas  del  Castillo. 


234  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  fault  of  his  inclination.  Whoever  has  seen  the 
breasts  of  the  peasantry  fringed  with  charms  older 
than  Carthage,  and  relics  as  old  as  Rome,  and  those 
of  the  upper  classes  plastered  with  decorations,  will 
not  expect  Spain  to  become  cou§cious_of__the  nine-J 
teentkxentury,  and  ready  to  welcome  it,  in  a  day." 

The  difference  between  a  despatch  and  a  letter 
to  a  friend  is  scarcely  so  marked  as  the  likeness. 
It  is  a  little  more  studied,  has  a  little  more  the 
air  of  a  composition,  and  fewer  sly  asides,  yet  it  is 
after  all  Lowell  speaking  of  the  things  that  interest 
him,  rather  than  the  American  minister  aware  of 
an  audience  in  the  State  Department.  In  the  same 
despatch  he  carries  forward  the  narrative  by  an 
account  of  his  participation  in  the  ceremonial  bull 
fight,  and  in  this  passage  one  might  fancy  him 
turning  aside  for  a  moment  to  have  a  few  words 
colloquially  with  Mr.  Evarts  and  half  assuming 
Parson  Wilbur's  tone. 

"  On  Friday  took  place  the  first  bull-fight,  at 
which  every  inhabitant  of  Madrid  and  all  foreign 
ers  commorant  therein  deemed  it  their  natural  right 
to  be  present.  The  latter,  indeed,  asserted  that 
the  teleological  reason  for  the  existence  of  lega 
tions  was  to  supply  their  countrymen  with  tickets 
to  this  particular  spectacle  for  nothing.  Though 
I  do  not  share  in  the  belief  that  the  sole  use  of  a 
foreign  minister  is  to  save  the  cost  of  a  valet  de 
place  to  people  who  can  perfectly  well  afford  to  pay 
for  one,  I  did  all  I  could  to  have  my  countrymen 
fare  as  well  as  the  rest  of  the  world.  And  so  they 
did,  if  they  were  willing  to  buy  the  tickets  which 


THE  SPANISH  MISSION  235 

were  for  sale  at  every  corner.  The  distribution  of 
them  had  been  performed  on  some  principle  un 
heard  of  out  of  Spain  and  apparently  not  under 
stood  even  there,  so  that  everybody  was  dissatisfied, 
most  of  all  those  who  got  them. 

"  The  day  was  as  disagreeable  as  the  Prince  of 
the  Powers  of  the  Air  could  make  it,  even  with 
special  reference  to  a  festival.  A  furious  and  bit 
terly  cold  wind  discharged  volleys  of  coarse  dust, 
which  stung  like  sleet,  in  every  direction  at  once, 
and  seemed  always  to  threaten  rain  or  snow,  but, 
unable  to  make  up  its  mind  as  to  which  would  be 
most  unpleasant,  decided  on  neither.  Yet  the 
broad  avenue  to  the  amphitheatre  was  continually 
blocked  by  the  swarm  of  vehicles  of  every  shape, 
size,  color,  and  discomfort  that  the  nightmare  of  a 
bankrupt  livery  stabler  could  have  invented.  All 
the  hospitals  and  prisons  for  decayed  or  con 
demned  carriages  seemed  to  have  discharged  their 
inmates  for  the  day,  and  all  found  willing  victims. 
And  yet  all  Madrid  seemed  flocking  toward  the 
common  magnet  on  foot  also. 

"  I  attended  officially,  as  a  matter  of  duty,  and 
escaped  early.  It  was  my  first  bull-fight,  and  will 
be  my  last.  To  me  it  was  a  shocking  and  brutal 
izing  spectacle  in  which  all  my  sympathies  were  on 
the  side  of  the  bull.  As  I  came  out  I  was  nearly 
ridden  down  by  a  mounted  guard,  owing  to  my 
want  of  any  official  badge.  For  the  moment  I  al 
most  wished  myself  the  representative  of  Liberia. 
Since  this  dreadful  day  16,000  spectators  who  were 
so  happy  as  to  be  present  have  done  nothing  but 
blow  their  noses  and  cough." 


236  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

In  a  private  letter  written  after  the  festivities, 
Lowell  refers  to  a  diplomatic  dinner  and  reception 
which  came  at  the  close,  and  says :  "  The  uniforms 
(there  are  six  special  embassies  here  with  very 
long  tails)  and  diamonds  were  very  brilliant.  But 
to  me,  I  confess,  it  is  all  vanity  and  vexation  of 
spirit.  I  like  America  better  every  day."  The 
picturesqueness  soon  satisfied,  and  he  shows  in  this 
despatch  how  his  mind  dwelt  rather  on  the  life 
which  gave  rise  to  and  was  typified  in  the  cere 
monial.  He  read  it  not  at  all  as  a  supercilious 
American,  whose  pride  in  the  barrenness  of  show 
at  home  might  be  as  great  as  Castilian  pride  in 
superfluity  of  decoration,  but  as  a  scholar  intent 
on  discovering  those  fundamental  truths  of  history 
which  are  seen  all  the  more  clearly  through  the 
medium  of  a  mind  at  home  in  the  rarefied  air  of  a 
genuine  American  freedom. 

Meanwhile  his  personal  tastes  led  him  to  the 
book-shops  and  he  fell  to  buying  books,  easily  par 
doning  any  extravagance  he  might  be  led  into  by 
the  reflection  that  his  treasures  would  go  ultimately 
to  the  library  of  his  college,  where  indeed  they  did 
finally  rest.  These  dips  into  the  refreshing  waves 
of  literature  made  him  conscious  of  where  his  real 
interest  lay,  but  he  was  nevertheless  not  a  perfunc 
tory  giver  of  his  service.  "  I  try  to  do  my  duty," 
he  writes  to  his  friend  Child,  u  but  feel  sorely  the 
responsibility  to  people  three  thousand  miles  away, 
who  know  not  Joseph  and  probably  think  him 
unpractical."  By  necessity  of  his  office,  he  was 
compelled  to  a  good  deal  of  social  activity,  and  this, 


THE   SPANISH  MISSION  237 

though  it  brought  him  in  contact  with  interesting 
persons,  was  so  opposed  to  a  long  habit  that  it 
wearied  him.  He  found  himself  looking  critically 
at  the  society  into  which  he  was  thrown.  He  saw 
little  evidence  of  exact  scholarship  in  the  educated 
men,  and  a  general  disposition  toward  an  indolent 
attitude  regarding  all  important  matters.  But  the 
engaging  side  of  the  Spanish  character  appealed  to 
him.  As  he  wrote  to  Child :  "  There  is  something 
oriental  in  my  own  nature  which  sympathizes  with 
this  '  let  her  slide '  temper  of  the  hidalgos." 

At  this  time  he  began  confidentially  to  whisper 
to  friends  at  home  that  he  doubted  if  he  could 
stand  it  much  more  than  a  year ;  but  from  the 
middle  of  April,  1877,  he  took  a  two  months'  leave 
of  absence  and  with  Mrs.  Lowell  made  an  agree 
able  journey  which  brought  him  back  in  better 
content  to  his  life  in  Madrid.  They  travelled  first 
from  Madrid  to  Tarbes,  thence  to  Toulouse,  Car 
cassonne,  Nismes,  Avignon,  and  Aries.  From 
France  they  went  to  Genoa,  to  Pisa  and  to  Naples, 
whence  they  took  steamer  to  Athens,  where  they 
stayed  a  week  or  so.  Lowell's  official  position  not 
only  drew  upon  him  a  little  official  ceremony,  but 
it  tinctured  his  reflections  also,  leading  him  to 
observe  and  note  matters  which  might  have  some 
bearing  upon  international  questions  or  might  af 
fect  in  a  way  his  own  special  function  as  minister 
to  Spain. 

"  I  have  just  come  back  from  the  Palace,"  he 
writes  to  Mr.  Norton  from  Athens,  31  May,  1878, 
"  where  I  was  presented  to  the  King,  a  fine  young 


238  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Dane,  good-looking  and  intelligent,  and  with  whom 
I  cannot  help  feeling  a  great  deal  of  sympathy 
just  now.  For  never  was  man  or  kingdom  in  a 
more  difficult  position.  Greece  was  quite  willing 
to  make  a  snatch  at  the  chestnuts  in  the  fire,  even 
at  the  risk  of  burning  her  own  fingers,  and  they 
would  n't  let  her.  I  have  seen  decayed  gentlemen 
who  lived  very  comfortably  on  the  former  glories 
of  their  family,  and  drove  about  in  an  imaginary 
coach  of  their  grandfathers'  —  but  with  Greece,  if 
one  can't  say  exactly  noblesse  oblige,,  it  at  least 
makes  her  uneasy,  and  the  laurels  of  Miltiades  are 
a  wakeful  bed.  She  has  an  immense  claim,  and 
no  resources  to  make  it  good  —  not  even  the  docu 
ments  that  prove  clear  descent.  It  is  curious,  but 
I  have  not  seen  a  face  of  the  type  that  statues  and 
medals  have  taught  us  to  consider  Greek.  In  a 
regiment  that  marched  by  yesterday  at  least  seven 
eighths  of  the  men,  perhaps  nine  tenths,  had  the 
nose  of  the  dying  gladiator,  which  I  take  it  is  Sla 
vonic.  Yet  continuity  of  language  is  certainly 
something,  and  I  am  so  stupid  that  I  can't  get  over 
my  astonishment  at  seeing  the  street-signs,  and 
hearing  the  newspapers  cried  in  Greek." 

A  sudden  opportunity  to  go  to  Constantinople 
shortened  the  stay  in  Athens,  and  Lowell  had  a 
glimpse  of  the  Orient.  "  My  Eastern  peep,"  he 
wrote  after  his  return  to  Madrid,  "has  been  of 
service  in  enabling  me  to  see  how  Oriental  Spain 
still  is  in  many  ways.  Without  the  comparison  I 
could  n't  be  sure  of  it." 

The  return  of  the  Lowells  to  Madrid  was  just 


THE   SPANISH  MISSION  239 

before  the  death  of  the  young  Queen  Mercedes, 
and  both  in  his  despatch  to  the  government,  dated 
3  July,  1878,  and  in  his  private  letters,  Lowell 
gave  expression  to  more  than  merely  official  con 
cern  over  the  sudden  taking-off.  His  despatch,  in 
particular,'  is  full  of  such  details  as  would  be 
noticed  by  one  genuinely  alert,  and  not  merely  car 
rying  out  the  performance  of  official  etiquette. 
Here,  for  example,  are  a  couple  of  passages  which 
show  the  artist  and  the  man  of  feeling  much  more 
than  the  diplomat :  — 

"During  the  last  few  days  of  the  Queen's  ill 
ness,  the  aspect  of  the  city  had  been  strikingly 
impressive.  It  was,  I  think,  sensibly  less  noisy 
than  usual,  as  if  it  were  all  a  chamber  of  death  in 
which  the  voice  must  be  bated.  Groups  gathered 
and  talked  in  undertone.  About  the  Palace  there 
was  a  silent  crowd  day  and  night,  and  there  could 
be  no  question  that  the  sorrow  was  universal  and 
profound.  On  the  last  day  I  was  at  the  Palace, 
just  when  the  poor  girl  was  dying.  As  I  crossed 
the  great  interior  courtyard,  which  was  perfectly 
empty,  I  was  startled  by  a  dull  roar,  not  unlike 
that  of  the  vehicles  in  a  great  city.  It  was  rever 
berated  and  multiplied  by  the  huge  cavern  of  the 
Palace  court.  At  first  I  could  see  nothing  that 
accounted  for  it,  but  presently  found  that  the 
arched  corridors  all  around  the  square  were  filled, 
both  on  the  ground  floor  and  the  first  story,  with 
an  anxious  crowd,  whose  eager  questions  and  an 
swers,  though  subdued  to  the  utmost,  produced  the 
strange  thunder  I  had  heard.  It  almost  seemed 


240  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

for  a  moment  as  if  the  Palace  itself  had  become 
vocal. 

"  At  the  time  of  the  royal  marriage  I  told  you 
that  the  crowd  in  the  streets  was  indifferent  and 
silent.  My  own  impression  was  confirmed  by  that 
of  others.  The  match  was  certainly  not  popular, 
nor  did  the  bride  call  forth  any  marks  of  public 
sympathy.  The  position  of  the  young  Queen  was 
difficult  and  delicate,  demanding  more  than  com 
mon  tact  and  discretion  to  make  it  even  tenable, 
much  more,  influential.  On  the  day  of  her  death, 
the  difference  was  immense.  Sorrow  and  sym 
pathy  were  in  every  heart  and  on  every  face.  By 
her  good  temper,  good  sense,  and  womanly  virtue, 
the  girl  of  seventeen  had  not  only  endeared  herself 
to  those  immediately  about  her,  but  had  become  an 
important  factor  in  the  destiny  of  Spain.  I  know 
very  well  what  divinity  doth  hedge  royal  person 
ages,  and  how  truly  legendary  they  become  even 
during  their  lives,  but  it  is  no  exaggeration  to  say 
that  she  had  made  herself  an  element  of  the  public 
welfare,  and  that  her  death  is  a  national  calamity. 
Had  she  lived  she  would  have  given  stability  to 
the  throne  of  her  husband,  over  whom  her  influ 
ence  was  wholly  for  good.  She  was  not  beautiful, 
but  the  cordial  simplicity  of  her  manner,  the  grace 
of  her  bearing,  her  fine  eyes,  and  the  youth  and 
purity  of  her  face,  gave  her  a  charm  that  mere 
beauty  never  attains."  How  the  death  of  the 
Queen  affected  Lowell's  imagination  may  further 
be  seen  in  the  sonnet  which  he  then  wrote,  but 
which  was  not  published  till  he  collected  his  final 
volume  of  poetry. 


THE   SPANISH   MISSION  241 

The  furlough  which  Lowell  had  taken  greatly 
refreshed  him,  and  he  took  up  his  life  again  with 
vigor  and  gayety,  applying  himself  not  only  to  the 
duties  of  the  legation,  but  to  the  better  acquisition 
of  the  Spanish  language,  a  fuller  knowledge  of  the 
literature,  and  the  study  of  those  larger  matters 
of  Spanish  polity  and  character  with  which  it  be 
came  a  minister  to  acquaint  himself.  "  I  have  come 
back,"  he  wrote  to  his  daughter,  "  a  new  man,  and 
have  flung  my  bine  spectacles  into  the  paler  Med 
iterranean.  I  really  begin  to  find  life  at  last  tol 
erable  here,  nay,  to  enjoy  it  after  a  fashion." 

Here  is  an  outline  of  his  days,  as  he  gives  it  in  a 
letter  to  a  friend  :  "  Get  up  at  8,  from  9  sometimes 
till  11  my  Spanish  professor,  at  11  breakfast,  at  12 
to  the  legation,  at  3  home  again  and  a  cup  of 
chocolate,  then  read  the  papers  and  write  Spanish 
till  a  quarter  to  7,  at  7  dinner,  and  at  8  drive  in  an 
open  carriage  in  the  Prado  till  10,  to  bed  at  12  to 
1.  In  cooler  weather  we  drive  in  the  afternoon. 
I  am  very  well,  —  cheerful  and  no  gout." 

He  set  to  work  systematically  on  Spanish  with  a 
cultivated  Spaniard  who  could  speak  no  English, 
and  with  whom  he  read  and  talked  every  day, 
besides  turning  French  and  English  literature  into 
Spanish.  "  I  am  working  now  at  Spanish,"  he 
writes,  2  August,  1878,  "  as  I  used  to  work  at  Old 
French  —  that  is,  all  the  time  and  with  all  my 
might.  I  mean  to  know  it  better  than  they  do 
themselves  —  which  is  n't  saying  much.  Consider 
ing  how  hard  it  has  always  been  for  me  to  speak  a 
language  —  even  one  I  knew  pretty  well  —  I  am 


242  JAMES  RUSSELL   LOWELL 

making  good  progress,  for  I  did  not  begin  till  my 
return  six  weeks  ago.  Before  that  I  had  n't  the 
spirit  for  it."  Of  his  tutor,  Don  Herminigildo 
Gines  de  los  Rios,  he  adds  :  "  He  is  a  fine  young 
fellow  who  lost  a  professor's  chair  for  his  liberal 
principles,  and  is  now  professor  in  the  Free  Uni 
versity  they  are  trying  to  found  here.  I  like  him 
very  much." 

Three  months  later  he  wrote  :  "  I  am  beginning 
to  talk  Spanish  pretty  well,  but  my  previous  know 
ledge  of  the  language  is  a  great  hindrance.  This 
may  seem  a  paradox,  but  it  is  n't.  What  I  mean 
is  that  I  know  too  much  to  catch  it  by  ear.  I 
understand  all  that  is  said  to  me,  and  accordingly 
cannot  (without  a  conscious  effort)  pay  attention 
to  the  forms  of  speech.  They  go  in  at  one  ear 
and  out  at  the  other.  But  I  can  write  it  now  with 
considerable  ease  and  correctness.  I  am  to  be 
admitted  to  the  Academy  this  month,  I  believe." 

Lowell  had  been  a  year  now  at  his  post,  and 
could  venture  to  write  of  the  internal  politics  of 
Spain  with  greater  assurance  because  he  had  a  more 
exact  knowledge.  His  despatch  to  the  government, 
No.  108,  dated  26  August,  1878,1  is  a  studied  ana 
lysis  of  the  character  of  the  parties  and  leaders  that 
composed  the  political  situation.  He  begins  by 
explaining  his  own  reticence  heretofore.  "  I  have 
always  been  chary,"  he  writes,  "  of  despatches  con 
cerning  the  domestic  politics  of  Spain,  because  my 
experience  has  taught  me  that  political  prophets 
who  make  even  an  occasional  hit,  and  that  in  their 

1  See,  for  the  larger  part,  Impressions  of  Spain,  pp.  23-42. 


THE   SPANISH   MISSION  243 

own  country,  where  they  may  be  presumed  to  know 
the  character  of  the  people,  and  the  motives  likely 
to  influence  them,  are  as  rare  as  great  discoverers 
in  science.  Such  a  conjunction  of  habitual  obser 
vation  with  the  faculty  of  instantaneous  logic  that 
suddenly  precipitates  the  long  accumulation  of  ex 
perience  in  crystals  whose  angles  may  be  measured 
and  their  classification  settled,  can  hardly  be  ex 
pected  of  an  observer  in  a  foreign  country.  Its 
history  is  no  longer  an  altogether  safe  guide,  for 
with  the  modern  facility  of  intercommunication, 
influences  from  without  continually  grow  more  and 
more  directly  operative,  and  yet  wherever,  as  in 
Spain,  the  people  is  almost  wholly  dumb,  there  are 
few  means  of  judging  how  great  the  infiltration  of 
new  ideas  may  have  been.  Where  there  is  no  well- 
defined  national  consciousness  with  recognized  or 
gans  of  expression,  there  can  be  no  public  opinion, 
and  therefore  no  way  of  divining  what  its  attitude 
is  likely  to  be  under  any  given  circumstances." 

In  forming  his  judgment  Lowell  seems  to  have 
used  the  broad  means  which  great  ambassadors 
have  always  had  recourse  to.  That  is,  he  did  not 
merely  sift  the  opinions  he  received  from  Span 
iards,  or  put  himself  under  the  tutelage  of  any  one 
man,  but  he  attended  the  debates  of  the  Cortes, 
he  read  the  more  intelligent  journals,  he  talked 
with  leaders  of  Spanish  opinion,  and  he  availed 
himself  of  converse  with  those  foreigners  travel 
ling  in  Spain,  whose  impressions  could  be  valued, 
and  behind  all  lay  an  old  acquaintance  with  Spanish 
history  and  literature,  constantly  added  to,  and  an 


244  JAMES  RUSSELL   LOWELL 

apprehension  of  Spanish  character,  reenforced  by 
personal  intercourse.  In  a  word,  he  went  about 
the  business  of  an  American  minister  to  Spain 
twith  the  same  painstaking:  care  and  the  same 
breadth  of  view  which,  as  a  scholar,  he  would  em 
ploy  on  the  interpretation  of  a  great  piece  of  litera 
ture.  He  did  not  neglect  the  commercial  side  of 
his  business,  but  he  properly  made  it  subordinate, 
holding  that  he  was  not  merely  representing  the 
country  as  an  eminent  consul,  but  was  assisting  at 
the  high  court  of  international  comity.  In  the 
analysis  which  he  attempts,  he  testifies  to  the  kind 
of  training  which  he  brings  to  the  task,  by  fixing 
his  attention  mainly  on  the  leaders  of  parties,  and 
studying  their  characters  and  aims.  Especially  is 
this  true  of  his  acute  examination  of  the  qualities 
of  Senor  Canovas  del  Castillo,  whom  he  regards  as 
not  only  the  ablest  politician,  but  capable  also  of 
being  Spain's  most  far-seeing  statesman,  and  he 
makes  his  observation  more  effective  by  the  com 
parison  which  he  draws  between  him  and  Senor 
Castelar. 

Mr.  Adee,  who,  when  Lowell  went  to  Spain,  was 
charge  d'affaires,  in  his  intelligent  and  apprecia 
tive  Introduction  to  "  Impressions  of  Spain,"  re 
marks  that  "  necessarily  lacking  the  knowledge  of 
the  true  springs  of  national  impulse  deep  down 
in  the  heart  of  the  masses,  he  dealt  with  the  sur 
face  indications,  and  analyzed  the  character  and 
motives  of  the  men  on  top,  whose  peculiarities 
most  caught  his  attention."  It  is  quite  as  much 
to  the  point  that  Lowell  did  not  assume  a  pro- 


THE   SPANISH  MISSION  245 

found  knowledge  of  the  Spanish  people,  and  that 
he  wrote  of  the  phenomena  most  on  the  field  of  his 
own  activity  as  a  minister  resident.  He  was,  more 
over,  too  sound  a  scholar  and  too  shrewd  a  man 
to  indulge  in  philosophizing  on  a  nation  from  the 
data  furnished  even  by  long  study  and  some  per 
sonal  experience.  Nevertheless,  whatever  he  lets 
fall  about  Spain,  as  well  as  his  more  studied  expres 
sion,  indicates  that  kind  of  insight  which  was  one 
of  Lowell's  gifts  of  nature,  and  stood  him  in  good 
stead  as  a  critic  of  books,  of  men,  and  of  nations. 

It  may  militate  against  a  respect  for  Lowell's 
judgment  in  such  matters,  that  after  a*  score  of 
years  the  vaticinations  which  he  ventured  to  ex 
press  in  this  despatch  have  not  yet  found  a  real 
ization  ;  yet  twenty  years  is  a  short  period  in  a 
nation's  life,  and  these  opinions  carry  with  them 
so  much  political  faith,  and  are  delivered  with  so 
much  moderation,  that  they  form  interesting  read 
ing  to-day,  and  may  well  be  repeated  here. 

"  My  own  conclusion,"  he  writes,  "  is  that  sooner 
or  later  (perhaps  sooner  than  later)  the  final  solu 
tion  (of  existing  political  problems)  will  be  a  con 
servative  republic  like  that  of  France.  Should  the 
experiment  there  go  on  prosperously  a  few  years 
longer,  should  the  French  Senate  become  sincerely 
republican  at  the  coming  elections,  the  effect  here 
could  not  fail  to  be  very  great,  perhaps  decisive. 
In  one  respect,  the  Spanish  people  are  better  pre 
pared  for  a  Republic  than  might  at  first  be  sup 
posed.  I  mean  that  republican  habits  in  their 
intercourse  with  each  other  are  and  have  long  been 


246  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

universal.  Every  Spaniard  is  a  eaballero,  and 
every  Spaniard  can  rise  from  the  ranks  to  position 
and  power.  This  also  is  in  part  from  the  Mahom 
etan  occupation  of  Spain.  Del  rey  ninguno  dbajo 
is  an  ancient  Spanish  proverb  implying  the  equality 
of  all  below  the  King.  Manners,  as  in  France, 
are  democratic,  and  the  ancient  nobility  here  as 
a  class  are  even  more  shadowy  than  the  dwellers 
in  the  Faubourg  Saint  Germain. 

"  In  attacking  Sefior  Canovas  the  opposition 
papers  dwell  upon  the  censorship  of  the  press, 
upon  the  reestablishment  of  monachism  under  other 
names,  and  upon  the  onerous  restrictions  under 
which  the  free  expression  of  thought  is  impossible. 
The  ministerial  organs  reply  to  the  first  charge 
that  more  journals  were  undergoing  suspension  at 
one  time  during  the  liberal  administration  of  Senor 
Sagasta  than  now,  and  this  is  true.  The  fact  is 
that  no  party,  and  no  party  leader,  in  Spain,  is 
capable  of  being  penetrated  with  the  truth,  per 
haps  the  greatest  discovery  of  modern  times,  that 
freedom  is  good  above  all  because  it  is  safe.  Senor 
Canovas  is  doing  only  what  any  other  Spaniard 
would  do  in  his  place,  that  is,  endeavoring  to  sup 
press  opinions  which  he  believes  to  be  mischievous. 
But  of  the  impolitic  extreme  to  which  the  principle 
is  carried  under  his  administration,  though,  I  sus 
pect,  without  his  previous  consent,  the  following 
fact  may  serve  as  an  example.  Senor  Manuel 
Merelo,  professor  in  the  Institute  del  Cardenal 
Cisneros,  published  in  1869  a  compendium  of 
Spanish  history  for  the  use  of  schools.  In  speak- 


THE   SPANISH  MISSION  247 

ing  of  the  Revolution  of  1868,  he  wrote,  '  It  is  said 
that  the  light  conduct  (las  Uviandades)  of  Queen 
Isabel  II.  was  one  of  the  causes  of  this  catastrophe.' 
After  an  interval  of  nine  years,  he  has  been  expelled 
from  his  chair  and  his  book  suppressed. 

"  If  any  change  should  take  place,  which  I  con 
fess  I  do  not  expect,  but  which,  in  a  country  of 
personal  government  and  pronunciamentos,  is  pos 
sible  to-morrow,  I  think  the  new  administration 
will  find  that  with  the  best  intentions  in  the  world 
a  country  which  has  been  misgoverned  for  three 
centuries  is  not  to  be  reformed  in  a  day.  At  the 
same  time,  I  believe  Spain  to  be  making  rapid  ad 
vances  toward  the  conviction  that  a  reform  is 
imperative,  and  can  only  be  accomplished  by  the 
good-will  and,  above  all,  the  good  sense  of  the 
entire  nation.  There  are  strong  prejudices  and 
rooted  traditions  to  be  overcome,  but  with  time 
and  patience  I  believe  that  Spain  will  accomplish 
the  establishment  of  free  institutions  under  what 
ever  form  of  government." 

In  the  course  of  Lowell's  incumbency,  General 
Grant  visited  Spain  on  his  journey  round  the 
world,  and  the  embassy,  of  course,  was  busy  in  its 
attention  to  the  great  American.  Lowell's  de 
spatch  to  his  government  is  a  model  of  orderly,  jdig-  I 
m'fiftd  statement  of  the  incidents  attending  Grant's  ' 
visit,  without  the  least  of  that  free,  personal  note 
which  characterizes  so  many  of  Lowell's  despatches. 
His  letters  home  on  the  same  event  naturally  are 
more  gossipy,  but  they  express  well  his  admiration 
of  Grant's  qualities. 


248  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

In  the  spring  of  1879  Lowell  seems  to  have 
been  in  some  uncertainty  about  his  continued  stay. 
There  had  been  some  talk  of  transferring  him  to 
Berlin,  which  he  did  not  desire,  but  the  President 
emphatically  declared  his  wish  that  Lowell  should 
remain  at  Madrid.  He  longed  to  be  at  home,  yet 
since  he  had  become  adjusted  to  the  place,  he 
wished  to  secure  the  advantage  and  increase  his 
acquaintance  with  Spain  and  the  character  of  the 
Spanish.  He  was  alert  and  ready  now  to  make 
more  confident  notes  regarding  the  people  among 
whom  he  was  living.  In  speaking  of  a  friend  who 
had  been  most  kind  to  them,  and  who  had  a  quar 
tering  of  English  race  in  her,  he  says  :  — 

"  She  speaks  both  languages  equally  well,  but 
is,  I  think,  cleverer  in  Spanish,  and  gives  it  a 
softness  of  intonation  which  is  almost  unexampled 
here  where  the  voices  of  the  women  are  apt  to 
be  harsh  and  clattering  like  those  of  the  Irish. 
Does  n't  Madame  Daulnay  say  something  of  the 
kind  ?  Nothing  strikes  me  more  than  the  rarity 
of  agreeable  voices,  and  (what  I  never  noticed  in 
any  other  country)  one  hears  in  the  street  the 
same  tones  as  in  the  salon.  I  am  for  once  in 
clined  to  admit  an  influence  of  climate.  To  jump 
from  the  physical  to  the  moral,  the  Spaniards  are 
the  most  provincial  people  conceivable,  as  much  so 
as  we  were  forty  years  ago.  It  is  comfortable,  for 
they  think  they  have  the  best  of  everything  —  even 
of  governments,  for  aught  I  know.  But  the  every 
thing  must  be  Spanish.  Even  their  actors  they 
speak  of  in  a  way  that  would  be  extravagant  even 


THE   SPANISH  MISSION  249 

of  Kachel,  and  I  never  saw  worse.  Perhaps  the 
most  oriental  thing  in  this  semi-oriental  people  is 
the  hyperbole  of  praise  which  the  critics  allow 
themselves.  It  is  quite  beyond  belief.  The  press, 
by  the  way,  at  least  that  of  Madrid,  is  remarkably 
decorous,  and  never  hints  at  private  scandal.  It 
may  be  because  the  duel  is  still  a  judicial  ceremony 
—  though  hardly,  for  there  is  never  any  harm 
done.  It  may  be  that  every  one  is  conscious  of  a 
skylight  in  his  own  roof,  through  which  a  stone 
might  come.  On  the  whole,  I  think  it  is  a  relic 
of  the  old  Spanish  Jiidalguia,  of  which  in  certain 
ways  I  think  there  is  a  good  deal  left.  But  I 
don't  pretend  to  know  the  Spaniards  yet  —  if  ever 
I  shall.  )  When  a  man  at  sixty  does  n't  yet  know 
himself,  he  is  apt  to  get  startled  and  carried  off  by 
the  readiness  with  which  he  hears  shallow  men 
pronounce  .judgment  on  a  whole  people^  The  only 
way  to  do  this,  I  suppose,  would  be  to  read  all 
history,  to  compare  the  action  of  different  races 
or  nations  under  similar  circumstances  (if  circum 
stances  ever  are  similar),  and  then,  eliminating  all 
points  of  likeness  common  to  human  nature,  to 
analyze  what  was  left,  if  anything  should  be  left." 
Since  it  was  determined  that  he  should  continue 
to  be  minister  to  Spain,  Lowell  proposed  to  use 
his  yearly  furlough  by  a  hurried  visit  home  in  the 
summer  of  1879,  leaving  Mrs.  Lowell  at  Tours. 
"  I  wish  Fanny  could  spend  the  summer  with  you 
in  Maiche,"  he  writes  to  Mr.  John  W.  Field  who, 
with  his  wife,  had  been  their  companions  for  a 
while  in  Spain  ;  "  but  we  both  think  the  other  plan 


250  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

wiser,  though  not  so  agreeable.  She  will  learn 
more  French  in  Tours,  and  I  think  we  can  find  a 
good  family  for  her  to  go  into  through  the  French 
pasteur  or  the  British  chaplain,  for  there  are  both 
in  the  town.  I  hope  to  be  in  Paris  by  the  25th, 
and  to  find  you  still  here.  Delay  for  a  day  or  two, 
I  beseech  you,  for  my  sake.  I  can't  stay  long,  for 
I  have  to  give  a  week  to  my  friends  in  England 
on  my  way  through.  I  can  hardly  contain  myself 
at  the  thought  of  going  home.  It  excites  me  more 
than  I  could  have  conceived  —  at  my  time  of  life  ! 
Were  I  as  young  as  you  it  would  n't  be  sur 
prising." 

This  was  written  15  June,  1879.  On  the  20th 
he  wrote  a  line  to  the  same  friend  to  say  that  they 
could  not  start  that  day,  as  they  had  intended,  and 
he  could  not  say  when  they  should,  since  Mrs. 
Lowell  was  not  well  enough  to  travel.  "  Nothing 
serious,"  he  adds,  but  as  the  days  passed  his  tone 
changed.  Serious  indeed  her  illness  proved  to  be. 
On  the  9th  of  July  he  wrote :  "  Twice  yesterday 
the  doctors  thought  all  was  over.  No  motion  of 
the  heart  could  be  detected  —  the  hands  and  feet 
and  nose  became  cold  —  and  the  dear  face  had  all 
the  look  of  death  —  the  eyes  altogether  leaden  and 
fixed.  She  had  been  without  speech  for  twelve 
hours.  What  speech  she  had  had  for  several  days 
had  been  mere  delirium.  Suddenly  at  about  six 
in  the  afternoon  she  revived  as  by  a  miracle,  said 
she  wished  to  be  changed  to  another  bed,  was  will 
ing  to  take  stimulants  in  order  to  strengthen  her 
for  it,  and  insisted  that  she  could  move  herself 


THE   SPANISH   MISSION  251 

from  one  bed  to  the  other.  This,  of  course,  was 
out  of  the  question.  After  being  changed  she  was 
perfectly  tranquil,  though  excessively  weak.  Dur 
ing  the  operation  she  spoke  French  to  the  So3ur 
who  is  nursing  her,  English  to  me,  and  Spanish  to 
her  maid,  all  coherently.  Both  doctors  declared 
they  had  never  seen  such  a  case,  or  heard  of  it, 
and  that  according  to  all  experience  she  ought  to 
have  died  ten  times  over  and  days  before.  I  have 
had  two,  one  to  relay  the  other,  so  that  one  could 
be  at  her  bedside  all  the  time.  One  has  slept  in 
the  house  —  when  he  could  sleep.  The  question 
now  is  of  building  up  strength.  It  has  been  typhus 
of  the  most  malignant  kind.  That  has  run  its 
course.  All  danger  is  not  yet  over,  but  hope  has 
good  grounds.  The  chances  are  now  in  her  favor, 
especially  as  she  wishes  to  live.  I  will  tell  you 
more  hereafter.  God  be  praised  !  " 

But  the  recovery  was  very  slow,  with  many  re 
lapses  and  with  periods  of  mental  disorder.  The 
original  purpose  was  held  to  as  long  as  it  seemed 
possible,  but  at  last,  as  summer  passed  into  autumn 
and  autumn  into  winter,  it  was  plain  that  all  plans 
of  travel  must  be  abandoned.  Mr.  Field  made  them 
a  flying  visit,  then  both  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Field  came 
to  Madrid  to  be  with  them  and  give  them  help 
and  comfort.  Their  friends  Senor  and  Senora  de 
Riano  were  most  attentive,  and  Mr.  D wight  Reed, 
Lowell's  secretary,  had  been  almost  indispensable. 
"  I  should  have  gone  quite  desperate  without  him," 
Lowell  writes  ;  and  again,  18  October :  "  Reed  has 
been  a  great  help.  He  comes  every  day  to  dinner 


252  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

and  distracts  me  a  little  with  rumors  from  the 
outer  world.  He  is  a  thoroughly  kind-hearted  and 
affectionate  fellow.  But  I  can't  tell  you  what  the 
loneliness  of  my  night  has  sometimes  been,  when  I 
have  heard  the  clock  strike  every  hour  and  every 
quarter  till  daylight  came  again  to  bring  the  cer 
tainty  that  she  was  no  better." 

It  was  not  till  the  end  of  December  that  Lowell 
could  speak  and  write  of  his  wife  with  anything 
like  relief  from  the  burden  of  anxiety.  During 
this  time  he  took  long  walks  with  his  friend  Mr. 
Field,  and  attended  to  his  necessary  work  at  the 
legation.  His  spirits  began  to  rise,  but  the  strain 
he  had  been  undergoing  had  been  intense.  Later, 
when  the  critical  condition  was  over,  though  re 
lapses  still  occurred,  he  could  rehearse  something 
of  his  experience :  "  I  have  had  a  very  long  and 
very  terrible  trial,  which  the  strange  country  and 
alien  tongue  have  made  worse,  and  these  ups 
and  downs  almost  desperate.  And  yet  without  the 
intervals  of  reason  and  hopeful  convalescence  from 
time  to  time,  I  know  not  how  I  could  have  endured 
it.  Indeed  I  cannot  now  comprehend  how  I  pulled 
through.  Friendship  has  helped  us,  it  is  true. 
During  the  first  weeks  Dona  Emilia  de  Riano 
(Gayangos's  daughter)  came  every  night  to  watch 
with  Fanny,  and  her  husband,  Don  Juan,  came  to 
see  me  every  day.  And  my  secretary,  a  most  true- 
hearted,  affectionate  fellow,  sat  up  with  me  night 
after  night  when  I  could  not  sleep,  and  kept  me 
from  eating  into  myself  all  the  time.  Otherwise  I 
was  without  even  an  acquaintance,  for  everybody 


THE   SPANISH  MISSION  253 

leaves  Madrid  during  the   summer.      Lately  the 
dear  Fields  have  been  a  great  prop. 

"  If  I  could  only  get  her  away !  But  that  is  out 
of  the  question  at  present.  And  all  the  while  I 
have  had  to  write  cool  little  bulletins  to  Mabel, 
turning  the  fair  side  outward  when  my  heart  was 
aching  with  anxiety  and  apprehension.  I  must 
have  expiated  many  sins  this  summer.  |I  feel  now 
as  if  nothing  could  kill  me,  and  am  saddened  more 
than  ever  with  a  conclusion  arrived  at  long  ago  by 
experience,  that  this  poor  human  nature  of  ours 
gets  used  to  almost  anything  —  a  conclusion  of  far- 
reaching  and,  in  some  ways,  disheartening  conse 
quence."  J 

As  the  year  waned,  Lowell  found  himself  re 
quired  to  give  his  attention  to  the  change  of  the 
Spanish  ministry,  a  political  event  which  caused 
more  excitement  than  he  had  seen  at  any  time 
during  his  stay  in  Madrid.  He  analyzed  the 
situation  in  his  despatch  to  the  government,  No. 
222,  dated  15  December,  1879,  and  in  his  con 
clusion  wrote :  "  It  is  hardly  yet  time  to  estimate 
the  effect  of  recent  events  on  the  peninsular  or 
colonial  destinies  of  the  country,  but  the  result 
thus  far  has  been  to  weaken  the  man  who  has 
hitherto  been  acknowledged  leader  and  inspirer 
of  the  Liberal  -  Conservative,  and  one  might  say 
therefore  of  the  Dynastic,  party  of  Spain.  Yet 
it  should  be  remembered  in  estimating  his  chances 
that  he  is  a  man  of  far  greater  resources,  of 
prompter  courage  in  taking  responsibility,  and  of 


254  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

more  convincing  and  persuasive  oratory  than  any 
of  his  contemporaries  and  rivals  in  party-leader 
ship.  All  sorts  of  wild  rumors  are  in  circulation, 
but  I  am  inclined  to  await  events  rather  than  to 
trust  in  the  vaticinations  of  journalists  who  mutu 
ally  excite  and  outbid  each  other  in  the  bewilder 
ing  competition  of  immediate  inspiration." 

Twelve  days  later,  in  despatch  No.  223,  Lowell 
returned  to  the  subject  of  the  change  of  ministry, 
and  after  some  shrewd  and  witty  conjectures  as  to 
the  course  of  events,  drawn  in  part  from  his  study 
of  the  Spanish  mind,  he  took  up  a  more  serious 
matter. 

"  The  crucial  question  for  the  new  cabinet  will 
not,  I  conceive,  arise  from  domestic  politics,  but 
rather  from  the  economic  reforms  demanded  by 
the  Island  of  Cuba.  Senor  Canovas  assured  me  a 
week  ago  that  he  '  was  ready  and  should  be  glad 
to  concede  any  reforms  that  would  not  produce  a 
deficit  in  the  Cuban  budget,  but  that  he  could  not 
consent  to  make  the  island  a  burden  on  the  penin 
sula.'  The  minister  of  Ultramar  said  substantially 
the  same  thing  to  me  last  evening.  I  told  him 
smilingly  that  I  had  a  deep  interest  in  the  matter, 
because  I  feared  that  I  should  have  my  hands  full 
of  Cuban  claims  if  they  delayed  much  longer. 

"  The  Cuban  deputies  and  senators  are,  I  be 
lieve,  very  much  discontented  with  the  turn  things 
have  taken.  Several  have  already  gone  home,  and 
more  are  to  follow.  The  affairs  of  Cuba  certainly 
look  ominous,  but  those  who  prophesy  a  general 
movement  for  separation  there  seem  to  forget  that 


THE   SPANISH   MISSION  255 

the  island  is  inhabited  by  two  distinct  and  mutu 
ally  suspicious  races,  and  that  the  whites,  being  of 
Spanish  origin,  are  as  obstinately  divided  in  polit 
ical  sentiment  as  their  kinsmen  here.  General 
Grant's  visit  to  Cuba  seems  to  attract  some  atten 
tion.  The  Minister  for  Foreign  Affairs  asked  me 
about  it  yesterday.  I  answered  carelessly  that  I 
knew  nothing  more  than  what  I  saw  in  the  news 
papers  ;  that  the  same  motives  no  doubt  carried 
the  general  thither  that  had  carried  him  to  Europe 
and  Asia ;  that  he  was  also  to  visit  Mexico,  a  cir 
cumstance  which  I  had  seen  connected  by  some 
journalists  with  an  apocryphal  movement  in  that 
country  for  annexation  to  the  United  States.  You 
can  infer  what  rumors  are  rife  by  a  question  asked 
me  by  the  Pro-nuncio  here,  4  whether  negotiations 
were  on  foot  for  a  purchase  of  Cuba  by  the  United 
States.'  I  told  him  that  such  a  report  was  very 
likely  to  arise  from  the  well-known  fact  that  Gen 
eral  Prim  when  in  power  had  favored  such  a 
scheme,  and  turned  the  conversation  to  something 
else." 

Early  in  1880,  entirely  without  Lowell's  know 
ledge  or  motion,  a  suggestion  from  one  or  two 
friends,  conspiring  with  the_jwLshes  of  the  State 
Department  at  Washington,  led  to  the  offer  of  a 
transfer  from  Madrid  to  London.  On  22  January, 
Lowell  wrote  to  his  daughter  :  "  Day  before  yester 
day  I  was  startled  with  a  cipher  telegram.  My 
first  thought  was  '  Row  in  Cuba  —  I  shall  have  no 
end  of  bother.'  It  turned  out  to  be  this  :  'Presi 
dent  has  nominated  you  to  England.  He  regards 


256  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

it  as  essential  to  the  public  service  that  you  should 
accept  and  make  your  personal  arrangements  to  re 
pair  to  London  as  early  as  may  be.  Your  friends 
whom  I  have  conferred  with  concur  in  this  view.' 
You  see  that  is  in  very  agreeable  terms,  and  at 
least  shows  that  Government  is  satisfied  with  my 
conduct  here.  I  was  afraid  of  its  effects  on  mamma 
at  first ;  but  she  was  pleased,  and  began  at  once  to 
contrive  how  I  could  accept,  which  she  wished  me 
to  do.  I  answered  :  '  Feel  highly  honored  by  the 
President's  confidence.  Could  accept  if  allowed 
two  months  delay.  Impossible  to  move  or  leave 
my  wife  sooner.' ' 

How  intimately  Lowell  connected  the  change 
with  the  condition  of  his  wife,  and  how  her  state 
subdued  any  exhilaration  he  might  have  felt,  ap 
pears  further  from  a  letter  written  13  February, 
1880,  to  a  friend  who  had  been  moving  in  the 
matter  at  home.  "  I  did  not  know  that  you  had 
any  hand  in  it  when  I  wrote  to  Mr.  Evarts  and 
told  him  that  had  I  been  consulted  I  should 
have  had  grave  doubts  about  accepting.  Accord 
ingly  I  wish  you  would  contrive  to  let  them  know 
at  Washington  that  I  was  in  utter  ignorance  of 
what  my  friends  were  doing.  Indeed,  I  hardly 
know  even  now  what  I  shall  (or  rather  what  I  can) 
do.  When  the  telegram  came  Fanny  had  been 
going  on  well  for  six  weeks,  but  about  a  fortnight 
ago  came  another  relapse  and  she  is  now  in  a  very 
nervous  state  again,  —  not  absolutely  out  of  her 
head,  but  incapable  of  controlling  herself.  ...  If 
this  relapse  should  prove  transitory  like  the  others, 


THE   SPANISH   MISSION  257 

I  shall  probably  be  obliged  to  leave  Fanny  here, 
and  go  to  London  for  my  presentation,  and  then 
come  back  on  leave.  For  I  cannot  very  well  re 
nounce  the  appointment  now  after  having  con 
sented  to  accept  it.  Fanny  was  so  well  when  the 
telegram  came  that  I  did  not  hesitate  to  consult 
her  about  it.  She  was  very  much  pleased  and  in 
sisted  on  my  accepting,  but  now  I  have  the  dread 
ful  suspicion  that  it  was  the  excitement  of  this 
news  that  upset  her  again.  It  is  true  that  the 
change  did  not  show  itself  for  more  than  a  week, 
and  there  are  reasons  for  attributing  it  to  physical 
causes,  but  I  cannot  shake  off  the  bitter  reproach 
of  having  been  imprudent.  And  yet  what  could  I 
do  ?  The  doctor  had  told  me  that  in  a  month  at 
farthest  I  should  be  able  to  move  her,  and  she  was 
so  perfectly  herself  then  that  I  had  no  fears.  It 
is  now  twelve  o'clock  (noon)  and  she  is  still  asleep. 
The  nurse  thinks  her  better.  She  woke  for  a  few 
moments,  took  some  beef  tea,  and  dropped  off 
again.  Sleep  is  always  good  for  her.  I  hope  it  is 
a  good  sign  that  this  relapse  has  not  been  so  bad 
as  the  last  before  it.  Before  that  she  had  been 
better  for  a  few  days  only  and  I  was  never  sure 
that  the  excitement  of  the  brain  was  more  than 
diminished.  But  when  this  began  she  had  been 
perfectly  self-possessed  for  weeks,  land  we  took 
great  comfort  together  in  the  twenty-third  psalm.  / 
I  am  glad  I  was  born  long  enough  ago  to  have 
some  superstitions  left.  They  stand  by  one  some 
how,  and  the  back  feels  that  it  has  a  brother  be- 


258  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

hind  it.1  I  long  to  be  at  home  again,  and  it  will 
not  be  a  great  while  now.  If  we  get  to  England, 
it  is  more  than  half  way." 

Lowell  carried  out  the  plan  he  had  outlined. 
His  friends,  Mr.  and  Mrs.  John  W.  Field,  were 
in  Madrid,  and  he  left  Mrs.  Lowell  under  their 
watchful  supervision,  and  went  reluctantly  to 
England,  reaching  London  7  March,  1880.  His 
friends  kept  him  informed  daily  by  telegraph  and 
letter  of  the  condition  of  the  invalid,  and  it  so 
chanced  that  she  had  another  relapse  shortly  after 
he  had  left  her.  He  was  in  despair,  and  heaped 
reproaches  upon  himself  for  having  gone  ;  yet 
when  he  reasoned,  he  saw  he  had  done  only  what 
he  must  do.  A  more  reassuring  telegram  came  on 
the  9th  of  March,  and  on  the  14th  he  was  per 
suaded  that  Mrs.  Lowell  had  issued  from  this  crisis 
and  come  fairly  out  on  the  other  side.  In  a  week 
more,  he  had  had  his  audience  with  the  Queen,  and 
taking  brief  leave  of  absence,  had  set  out  for  Ma 
drid,  whence  he  was  now  able  to  remove  his  wife 
to  England.  The  life  of  both  of  them  was  bright- 
fened  during  the  summer  that  followed  by  the 
coming  of  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Burnett  on  a  brief  visit 
from  America. 

1  "  Bare  is  back  without  a  brother  behind  it." 

Norse  Proverb. 


CHAPTER  XV 

THE   ENGLISH   MISSION 

1880-1885 

THE  two  and  a  half  years  that  Lowell  passed  at 
Madrid  formed  an  excellent  preparation  for  the 
more  important  post  which  he  was  to  occupy  near 
the  Court  of  St.  James.  The  etiquette  of  a  high, 
diplomatic  position  does  not  differ  greatly  in  the 
different  capitals  ;  if  anything,  more  punctilio 
would  be  observed  in  Madrid  than  in  London. 
It  was  something,  at  any  rate,  to  have  become 
wonted  to  the  function  of  a  minister  plenipoten 
tiary.  But  this  was  a  trifle  compared  with  the 
advantage  which  Lowell  enjoyed  in  the  possession 
\  now  of  self-confidence.  He  had  tried  on  the  coat 
and  found  it  fitted  him  well ;  he  could  wear  it  in 
London  where  he  would  be  in  a  far  more  conspicu 
ous  position.  )  He  had  practised  the  diplomatic  art 
in  a  country  where  the  language  was  foreign  and 
the  race  unfamiliar,  and  if  in  his  short  residence  he 
could,  with  Some  assurance,  analyze  the  internal 
political  conditions,  he  might  hope  more  quickly  to 
be  able  to  apprehend  nice  discriminations  in  the 
current  politics  of  a  country  where  he  was  at  home 
in  language,  literature,  and  history .} 


260  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

It  is  scarcely  to  be  doubted  that  his  performance 
of  diplomatic  duties  in  Spain  had  made  it  easy  for 
the  President  to  appoint  him  to  the  highest  foreign 
station.  But  it  is  also  likely  that  the  choice  was 
made  mainly  upon  the  ground  of  Lowell's  fitness 
to  act  as  a  mediator  between  the  two  countries. 
With  the  exception  of  Motley,  there  never  had 
been  an  American  minister  to  England  who  was 
first  and  foremost  a  man  of  letters,  and  yet  in  no 
other  field  of  human  endeavor  was  there  so  great 
a  community  of  intelligence.  Literature  had  been 
honored  in  its  representatives  in  many  courts  of 
Europe  and  in  consular  offices,  but  the  presump 
tion  is  that  heretofore  political  and  commercial 
relations  with  England  had  been  of  so  complex  a 
character  that  it  was  thought  desirable  to  have 
a  trained  man  of  affairs  or  of  law  and  states 
manship  at  the  post.  Moreover,  it  was  a  great 
political  prize,  and  men  of  letters  are,  as  a  rule, 
non-combatants  in  politics.  But  Lowell  had  been 
initiated  in  Spain,  and  it  was  a  far  more  simple 
process,  so  far  as  political  effect  might  be  consid 
ered,  to  transfer  him  to  England  than  to  have 
made  that  a  direct  appointment. 

(The  educated  men  of  America  were  delighted 
with  the  appointment.  They  felt  at  once  that  they 
had  a  spokesman.  And  it  may  fairly  be  said  that 
Americans  generally  were  gratified  ;  for  a  man  of 
letters  who  has  won  high  recognition,  especially  if 
his  work  has  been  in  the  field  of  poetry,  history,  or 
general  literature,  occupies  a  secure  place  in  the 
regard  of  his  countrymen,  and  is  subject  to  less 


THE  ENGLISH  MISSION  261 

suspicion  or  jealousy  than  one  in  any  other  con 
spicuous  position.  By  its  very  nature  a  literary 
reputation  ia  ^widespread  and  not  local.  A  very 
great  lawyer,  unless  he  has  also  been  in  the  public 
eye  as  a  member  of  government,  is  taken  on  trust 
by  all  but  his  professional  brethren.  A  great 
author  through  the  process  of  growing  great  has 
become  known  to  increasing  numbers  of  his  coun 
trymen.  It  is  doubtful  if  any  other  author,  save 
Longfellow,  would  at  once  have  been  so  accepted 
by  Americans  as  their  proper  representative  in 
London. 

On  the  other  side,  though  the  English  as  a  great 
reading  body  are  not  very  familiar  with  Ameri 
can  literature,  the  leaders  of  opinion,  the  class 
that  stands  nearest  the  government,  know  it  gener 
ously,  and  while  it  would  be  necessary  to  make  the 
acquaintance  of  a  representative  of  American  law, 
business,  or  politics,  a  representative  of  American 
letters  and  scholarship  would  already  be  a  familiar 
name.  Certain  it  is  that  Lowell  in  going  to  Lon 
don  went  at  once  into  the  midst  of  friends.  He 
had  been  there  but  two  or  three  days  when  he 
wrote  :  "  I  am  overwhelmed  already  with  invita 
tions  though  I  have  not  put  my  arrival  in  the 
papers ;  "  and  a  few  days  later  :  "  I  lunched  with 
Tennyson  yesterday.  \  He  is  getting  old  and  looks] 
seedy)*  I  am  going  in  to  take  a  pipe  with  him  the 
first  free  evening.  Pipes  have  more  thawing 
power  than  anything  else." 

And  yet  it  must  not  be  forgotten  that  Lowell 
himself  had  been  a  frank  critic  of  England  and 


262  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

carried  in  his  own  mind  a  temper  which  it  might 
seem  would  be  in  the  way  of  a  perfectly  cordial 
relation.  In  his  political  papers  and  in  the  second 
series  of  the  "  Bigiow  Papers  "  he  had  been  very 
outspoken.  His  well-known  article  on  "  A  Certain 
Condescension  in  Foreigners,"  with  its  pungent  sen 
tences,  was  not  easily  to  be  overlooked,  and  there  is 
a  letter l  which  Mr.  Norton  prints,  written  in  1865, 
that  may  be  taken  as  a  truthful  report  of  the  atti 
tude  held  by  Lowell  toward  England  during  the 
great  war,  and  modified  only  slightly  by  time. 
There  was  therefore  a  little  consciousness  on  his 
part  as  if  he  were  not  wholly  a  persona  grata^  and 
also  that  he  must  stand  by  his  colors,  which  gave 
him  a  certain  brusqueness  in  his  early  public  appear 
ances.  It  did  not  take  long,  however,  for  him  to 
adjust  himself  in  his  new  relations,  for  after  all  it 
was  the  greater  England  to  which  he  was  sent,  and 
the  world  with  which  he  came  immediately  into 
contact  was  very  hospitable.  At  the  same  time, 
throughout  his  stay  in  England  he  showed  a  cer 
tain  vigilance  as  the  champion  of  American  insti 
tutions,  speech,  and  manners  which  gave  him  the 
air  of  combativeness.  An  Englishman  who  was 
often  his  host  said  :  "  I  like  Mr.  Lowell.  I  like  to 
have  him  here.  I  keep  him  as  long  as  I  can,  and 
I  am  always  in  terror  lest  somebody  shall  say  some 
thing  about  America  that  would  provoke  an  explo 
sion."  Mr.  Smalley,  who  quotes  this,  adds  that 
Lowell  had  seen  the  inside  of  more  country  houses 
in  England  than  any  American  who  ever  lived ; 

1  Letters,  i.  343. 


THE   ENGLISH  MISSION  263 

and  that  there  was  not  one  in  which  he  had  not  let 
fall  some  good  American  seed.1 

"  Sometimes,"  says  Max  Miiller,  "  even  the  most 
harmless  remark  about  America  would  call  forth 
very  sharp  replies  from  him.  Everybody  knows 
that  the  salaries  paid  by  America  to  her  diplomatic 
staff  are  insufficient,  and  no  one  knew  it  better 
than  he  himself.  But  when  the  remark  was  made 
in  his  presence  that  the  United  States  treated  their 
diplomatic  representatives  stingily,  he  fired  up, 
and  discoursed  most  eloquently  on  the  advantages 
of  high  thoughts  and  humble  living."  2 

The  official  business  which  occupies  an  Ameri 
can  minister  in  England  is  the  formal  occasion  for 
accrediting  him  to  the  Court ;  but  there  has  been 
a  growing  disposition  to  treat  this  as  after  all  a 
secondary  consideration  beside  the  less  tangible 
one  of  increasing  good  feeling  between  the  peoples 
of  the  two  countries.  Special  envoys,  telegrams, 
and  despatches  might  serve  for  the  transaction  of 
business,  but  just  as  the  countless  personal  letters 
which  pass  between  correspondents  on  both  sides 
of  the  Atlantic  go  to  make  the  invisible  web  which 
unites_tlue_  two  nations,  so  the  personal  intercourse 
which  the  American  minister  has  with  Englishmen 
may  have  a  weighty  effect  in  preserving  an  entente 
cordiale. 

The  English  more  than  any  other  nation  have 
cultivated  the  dinner-table  and  the  social  meeting 
for  the  purpose  of  exchanging  ideas  regarding  pub- 

1  New  York  Tribune,  16  August,  1891. 

2  Auld  Lang  Syne,  p.  179. 


264  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

lie  affairs.  Where  an  American  public  man  will 
send  for  a  reporter  of  a  widely  read  newspaper  if 
he  has  some  important  message  to  deliver  to  his 
constituents  or  the  people  at  large,  the  English 
man  will  accept  an  invitation  to  a  dinner  of  some 
society,  and  take  that  occasion  for  making  a  speech 
which  will  be  reported  and  commented  on  in  all 
the  great  dailies  of  the  city  and  the  provinces. 
Dinners,  unveilings,  cornerstones,  meetings  of  so 
cieties,  —  these  all  become  the  accepted  occasions 
for  the  propagation  of  ideas,  and  the  most  unrhe- 
torical  people  in  civilization  blurt  out  their  views 
at  such  times  with  a  certain  scorn  of  eloquence  and 
admiration  of  candor.  Moreover,  the  smallness  of 
the  great  legislative  chambers  conduces  to  the 
conversational  tone,  and  thus  public  speakers  are 
trained  to  the  disuse  of  oratory. 

It  was  natural  that  Lowell  should  be  in  demand 
on  such  occasions,  and  it  was  inevitable  that  he 
should  make  a  remarkable  impression.  He  had 
for  years  cultivated  the  art  of  speaking  to  small 
assemblies  when  he  had  a  congenial  subject  and 
a  responsive  audience.  He  had  the  readiness  of  a 
practised  writer,  and  he  had  above  all  a  spontane- 
ousness  of  nature  which  made  him  one  of  the  best 
1  of  conversationalists.  It  was  but  a  slight  remove 
from  his  lecture-room  at  Harvard,  or  his  study 
at  Elmwood,  to  an  English  dinner-table,  and  the 
themes  on  which  he  was  called  upon  to  speak  were 
very  familiar  to  him.  Literature,  the  common  ele 
ments  of  English  and  American  life,  the  distinc- 
tiveness  of  America,  these  were  subjects  on  which 


THE  ENGLISH  MISSION  265 

he  was  at  home,  and  he  brought  to  his  task  a 
manner  quiet  yet  finished  by  years  of  practice. 
Had  set  orations  been  his  business,  he  would 
scarcely  have  made  so  remarkable  an  impression 
as  he  made  by  his  off-hand  speeches.  Yet  it  must 
not  be  supposed  that  these  were  careless,  im 
promptu  affairs.  He  was  helped  by  his  readiness, 
but  he  did  not  rely  upon  it.  He  thought  out  care 
fully  his  little  address,  and  sometimes  wrote  it  out 
in  advance  even  when  he  made  no  use  of  manu 
script.  It  was  not  unalloyed  pleasure.  "  I  am  to 
speak  at  the  Academy  dinner  to-morrow,"  he  writes 
to  a  friend,  after  he  had  had  a  couple  of  years  prac 
tice  in  such  functions,  "  which  does  not  make  me 
happy,  —  and  not  a  fit  word  to  say  has  yet  occurred 
to  me.  They  think  I  like  to  speak,  I  'do  it  so 
easily.' '  He  was  not  one  to  rise  with  the  declara 
tion  that  he  had  nothing  to  say,  and  then  to  say  it. 
He  respected  his  audience,  and  above  all,  with  all 
his  bonhomie,  he  never  forgot  that  he  was  not  a  pri 
vate  guest,  but  the  representative  of  a  great  nation. 
Not  that  he  always  harped  on  the  one  string  of  a 
community  of  nature  and  interest  in  the  two  coun 
tries,  but  he  remembered  that  he  was  invited  not 
simply  as  a  man  of  letters  but  as  the  American 
minister. 

When  Lowell  went  to  England  he  apprehended 
difficulty  in  maintaining  the  position  of  an  Ameri 
can  minister  on  his  salary,  which  could  not  greatly 
be  increased  from  his  modest  fortune.  Indeed,  he 
said  frankly  that  it  would  have  been  quite  impos 
sible  to  play  the  host  as  it  should  be  played,  except 


266  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

for  the  unhappy  fortune  which  compelled  Mrs. 
Lowell  to  withdraw  from  society.  His  friends  told 
him,  with  that  candor  which  makes  English  society 
at  once  so  refreshing  and  so  amusing,  that  since 
Mrs.  Lowell  could  not  entertain,  he  was  quite  at 
liberty  to  accept  all  manner  of  invitations,  and  be 
under  no  obligation  to  return  them.  So  his  public 
duties  called  him  in  many  directions  socially,  and 
he  was  able,  besides  doing  a  little  business  by  the 
way  in  these  diversions,  to  see  the  best  of  the  intel 
lectual  life  of  the  day.  He  had  a  choice  group  of 
friends  who  had  known  him  before  he  was  a  public 
man,  and  his  position  gave  him  the  entree  in  all 
society,  but  he  whispered  :  "  I  think  on  the  whole 
I  find  no  society  so  good  as  what  I  have  been 
accustomed  to  at  home." 

All  this  brought  him,  moreover,  an  endless  cor 
respondence  which  quite  effectually  interfered  with 
the  friendly  letters  which  had  been  so  natural  an 
outlet  of  his  moods.  "  Did  you  ever  happen,"  he 
writes  to  Mr.  Field,  20  August,  1880,  "to  be 
watching  the  top  of  a  post  when  a  snowstorm  was 
beginning  ?  You  would  have  seen  first  a  solitary 
flake  come  wavering  down  and  make  a  lodgment, 
then  another  and  another,  till  finally  a  white  night 
cap  covered  the  whole  knob.  My  head  is  very  like 
that  wooden  protuberance,  and  that 's  the  way  let 
ters  descend  upon  it.  While  I  am  answering  one 
a  dozen  more  have  fallen,  and  if  I  let  a  day  go  by, 
I  am  overwhelmed.  And  days  go  by  without  my 
knowing  it.  You  tell  Mabel  that  five  have  passed 
since  you  wrote  —  which  is  simply  absurd.  I  think 
it  was  about  fifteen  minutes  ago  that  I  got  it." 


THE   ENGLISH   MISSION  267 

"During  Mr.  Lowell's  service  as  Minister  to 
England,"  writes  Mr.  R.  R.  Bowker,  who  was  at 
this  time  resident  in  London,  "  Mrs.  Lowell  was 
constantly  an  invalid,  as  the  after  effect  of  typhus 
fever  while  in  Spain,  and  it  was  delightful  to  see 
Mr.  Lowell's  gallantry  —  for  no  other  word  ex 
presses  it  —  as  she  was  brought  down  in  her  inva 
lid  chair  to  the  dining-room  or  drawing-room.  But 
she  never  lost  the  happy  laugh  so  characteristic  of 
her,  and  her  charm  of  direct  and  pleasant  manner. 
Her  condition  made  it  impossible  for  Mr.  Lowell 
to  give  receptions  or  large  dinners,  so  that  his 
household  guests  were  confined  to  a  few  Americans. 
In  an  invitation  to  dine  on  Christmas  day  of  1880, 
he  writes  :  4  We  shan't  be  very  jolly,  but  there  will 
be  a  spice  of  home.'  It  was  at  that  dinner,  I 
think,  that  Mrs.  Lowell  had  quite  set  her  heart  on 
having  cranberry  sauce  with  the  turkey,  and  so 
had  obtained  from  that  wonderful  American  store 
house  at  45  Piccadilly  a  supply  of  cranberries. 
But  the  servants,  who  had  mostly  come  with  the 
Lowells  from  Spain,  could  not  be  made  to  under 
stand  what  was  wanted,  and  it  was  only  when,  two 
or  three  courses  after  the  turkey,  Mrs.  Lowell  hit 
upon  calling  for  the  '  compote  rouge '  that  we  ob 
tained  our  cranberry  sauce  as  a  separate  course.  .  .  . 

"  Mr.  Lowell  was  always  charmingly  gallant,  and 
on  one  occasion  at  the  house  in  Lowndes  Square 
there  was  present  a  young  American  actress  from 
whom  he  asked  some  recitation.  She  offered  to 
read  the  balcony  scene  from  '  Romeo  and  Juliet ' 
but  said  she  had  no  Romeo,  whereupon  Mr.  Lowell 


268  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

volunteered,  the  Juliet  reciting,  from  behind  the 
sofa,  and  the  most  charming  of  Romeos,  though 
somewhat  elderly  for  the  part,  reading  from  in 
front." 

The  duties  of  his  office  in  the  first  part  of  his 
service  were  not  onerous  except  as  multitudinous 
details  bring  weariness,  but  the  long  illness  of 
President  Garfield  during  the  summer  of  1881 
brought  a  strain  upon  the  emotions,  and  called  for 
the  constant  exercise  of  a  refined  courtesy.  For, 
aside  from  the  formal  exchange  of  sympathy  which 
would  be  inevitable  under  such  circumstances, 
there  was  that  spontaneous  and  varied  expression 
of  grief  on  all  sides,  to  which  Lowell  refers  with 
so  much  feeling  and  such  exquisite  reserve  of 
speech  in  the  address  on  Garfield  which  was  given 
at  the  Memorial  Meeting  in  Exeter  Hall,  24  Sep 
tember,  1881,  and  is  preserved  in  "  Literary  and 
Political  Addresses."  Lowell  was  there  speaking 
to  Americans  in  the  presence,  as  it  were,  of  all 
England,  and  the  note  of  sobriety  and  deep  feel 
ing  and  strong  faith  which  he  struck  still  has  the 
beauty  and  richness  with  which  it  fell  on  the  ears 
of  his  sympathetic  audience.  He  was  constantly 
called  upon  during  that  anxious  season  of  the 
President's  illness  to  respond  to  letters  of  sympa 
thy.  A  despatch  which  he  sent  to  the  Secretary 
of  State  a  fortnight  after  the  blow  shows  the  same 
dignity  in  his  official  communication,  and  illus 
trates  also  the  atmosphere  in  which  he  was  living 
throughout  the  summer.  It  is  No.  219,  and  is 
dated  16  July,  1881 :  — 


THE   ENGLISH   MISSION  269 

"  Warm  expressions  of  sympathy  with  the  Presi 
dent,  with  Mrs.  Garfield,  and  with  the  people  of 
the  United  States,  and  of  abhorrence  of  the  atro 
cious  attempt  on  the  President's  life  have  reached 
this  Legation  from  all  parts  of  England  and  Scot 
land.  From  the  Queen  to  the  artisan,  the  feeling 
has  been  universal  and  very  striking  in  its  mani 
festation.  The  first  question  in  the  morning  and 
the  last  at  night  for  the  first  ten  days  after  the 
news  came  was  always  :  4  How  is  the  President  ? ' 
Had  the  President's  life  not  been  spared,  the  de 
monstration  of  feeling  would  have  been  comparable 
with  that  which  followed  the  assassination  of  Mr. 
Lincoln. 

"  The  interest  of  the  Queen  was  shown  in  an  un 
usually  marked  way,  and  was  unmistakable  in  its 
sincerity  and  warmth.  By  her  special  request  all 
our  telegrams  were  at  once  forwarded  to  her  at 
Windsor.  At  Marlborough  House,  on  the  14th 
she  sent  for  me,  in  order  to  express  in  person  her 
very  great  satisfaction  that  the  condition  of  the 
President  was  so  encouraging. 

"  I  need  not  waste  words  in  telling  you  with  what 
profound  anxiety  your  telegrams  were  awaited,  nor 
how  much  encouragement  and  consolation  were 
brought  by  the  later  ones.  I  may  be  permitted  to 
thank  you,  however,  for  the  entire  composure  which 
characterized  them,  and  which  enabled  me  to  main 
tain  my  own  while  prophets  of  evil  were  hourly 
sending  me  imaginary  news. 

"  The  impression  produced  here  by  the  Presi 
dent's  dignity  and  fortitude  may  be  almost  called  a 


270  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

political  event,  for  I  believe  that  it  has  done  more 
to  make  a  juster  estimate  of  American  character 
possible  here  than  many  years  of  commercial  or 
even  social  intercourse  would  have  done." 

It  was  with  a  great  sense  of  relief  from  tension, 
after  the  death  of  the  President,  that  Lowell  took 
a  leave  of  absence,  and  made  a  short  trip  to  Italy. 
"  I  am  just  starting,"  he  writes  to  T.  W.  Higgin- 
son,  8  October,  1881,  "  for  the  continent  on  a  leave 
of  absence  which  I  sorely  need.  Wish  me  joy,  I 
am  going  to  Italy  !  Whether  I  may  not  find  some 
body  else  in  my  chair  at  the  Legation  when  I  come 
back  is  one  of  those  problems  that  I  cannot  solve, 
and  care  little  about,  though  now  that  I  have  made 
friendships  here  I  should  like  to  stay  on  a  little 
longer.  Did  you  know  that  I  have  five  grand 
children  ?  " 

Unfortunately  Mrs.  Lowell  was  not  sufficiently 
restored  to  health  to  accompany  him,  but  he  had 
the  good  fortune  to  find  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Field  at  the 
end  of  his  journey.  "  We  reached  Flushing,"  he 
wrote  Mrs.  Lowell  from  Frankfort,  10  October,  "  at 
half-past  six  in  the  morning  and  there  took  the 
train  for  this  place.  We  travelled  several  thou 
sand  miles,  as  it  seemed  to  me,  through  Holland, 
every  now  and  then  seeing  a  hunchbacked  church 
gathering  its  village  under  its  wings  like  a  cluck 
ing  hen  when  she  sees  the  hawk  in  the  air,  at  every 
turn  a  windmill  and  low  fields  bordered  with  trees 
that  always  look  just  beginning  to  grow  —  Heaven 
knows  why.  After  crossing  the  Prussian  frontier, 
the  dead  level  continued  as  far  as  Cologne.  The 


THE   ENGLISH   MISSION  271 

only  difference  was  that  the  trees  were  larger  and 
often  one  saw  pretty  linden-alleys  leading  up  to 
the  little  towns.  The  railway  officials  had  a  more 
close-buttoned  military  air,  and  were  always  salut 
ing  invisible  superiors." 

On  the  12th  he  wrote  from  Weimar:  "I  left 
Frankfort  at  noon  on  Monday  and  got  here  to 
wards  seven  in  the  evening.  The  first  half  of  the 
journey  was  through  one  of  the  loveliest  valleys 
(of  the  broad  and  basking  kind)  I  ever  saw.  The 
only  name  I  recognized  in  this  part  of  the  way 
was  Offenbach,  where  Goethe  had  his  adventures 
with  Lilli  a  hundred  and  more  years  ago,  but  after 
passing  Elm  the  names  grew  more  familiar  and 
famous.  Fulda,  Gotha,  Erfurt,  Eisenach.  Wei 
mar  is  a  neat  little  capital  which  looks  about  as 
large  as  Salem,  and  where  the  one  stranger  is  as 
much  stared  at  as  there.  Why  it  is  a  capital,  and 
especially  why  it  should  be  where  it  is,  puzzles  me. 
The  park  is  really  delightful,  with  fine  trees  and 
one  of  the  most  beautiful  streams  running  through 
it  I  ever  saw.  The  water  is  so  clear  as  to  seem 
almost  luminous,  the  water-mosses  are  as  green  as 
those  of  the  sea,  and  some  horse-chestnuts  that  had 
fallen  in  shone  like  live  coals.  I  walked  about  the 
town  all  the  forenoon." 

He  paid  a  visit  to  Goethe's  house  and  the  next 
day  went  on  to  Dresden,  where  he  reflected  that  it 
was  just  twenty-five  years  since  he  was  living  there, 
a  young  man  then,  an  old  man  now,  but  that  he 
should  find  the  Sistine  Madonna  and  a  few  other 
old  friends  as  young  as  ever.  From  Dresden  he 


272  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

went  to  Venice,  and  there  he  found  his  friend  Mr. 
Field.  "  He  is  as  young  and  social  as  ever,"  he 
wrote  to  Mr.  Norton,  31  October  ;  "  has  made  the 
acquaintance  here  of  everybody  he  did  n't  know 
before,  and  goes  with  me  to  Florence  on  Thursday. 
The  Brownings  have  also  been  here,  but  go  to 
morrow  morning.  The  weather  has  been  brutto 
assai,  only  two  partly  fine  days  during  the  time  I 
have  been  here,  and  to-day  it  rains.  We  hear  of 
three  inches  of  snow  at  Vicenza,  and  I  can  well  be 
lieve  it,  so  cold  has  it  been.  Che  tempo  straon- 
gante  !  Still,  Venice  has  been  beautiful  and  dear 
for  all  that.  Browning  begins  to  show  his  seventy 
years  (he  will  be  seventy  next  February)  a  little, 
though  his  natural  [force]  be  not  abated.  I  hear 
that  I  am  to  stay  in  England,  all  rumors  to  the  con 
trary  notwithstanding.1  Fanny  continues  better. 
She  did  not  venture  to  come  with  me.  I  shall 
probably  go  on  as  far  as  Rome,  and  get  back  to 
London  in  time  for  the  best  fogs." 

To  Mrs.  Lowell  he  wrote  from  Venice,  1  No 
vember  :  "  To-day  the  sky  is  bright  for  the  third 
time  since  my  arrival.  All  the  other  days  have 
been  cloudy  or  rainy,  with  a  cold  tramontanes  blow 
ing  steadily  and  strongly.  .  .  .  You  remember  that 
Lady  Gordon  told  me  I  should  find  a  bateau 
mouche  plying  on  the  Grand  Canal.  I  did  not 
expect  to  be  personally  inconvenienced  by  it ;  but 
as  it  lessened  the  custom  of  the  gondoliers  they 
have  all  struck  work  this  morning,  and  one  can't 

1  The  succession  of  Mr.  Arthur  to  the  presidency  naturally  set 
flying  all  sorts  of  rumors  about  a  fresh  deal  in  high  offices. 


THE  ENGLISH   MISSION  273 

get  a  barca  for  love  or  money.  Poor  fellows,  they 
will  find,  as  others  have  done,  that  steam  is  stronger 
than  they.  ...  I  have  given  up  Rimini  owing  to 
the  cold,  and  shall  start  for  Florence  day  after 
to-morrow  with  Field,  who  is  younger  and  livelier 
than  ever,  —  and  makes  more  acquaintances  every 
day  than  I  should  in  a  year." 

The  two  spent  a  week  in  Florence  and  then  went 
to  Rome  where  they  foregathered  with  Story,  and 
after  a  few  days  there  Lowell  set  out  alone  on  his 
return  to  London.  He  made  a  brief  stay  in  Paris, 
and  wrote  thence  to  Mr.  Field,  29  November, 
1881 :  "  I  walked  a  good  deal  yesterday  and  felt 
very  well,  but  to-day  my  head  aches  and  things  have 
come  back.  I  met  young  Longfellow,  who  was 
to  start  for  London  last  evening;  also  Thornton 
Lothrop,  who  came  back  with  me  to  my  hotel 
(where,  by  the  way,  I  have  a  small  suite  —  draw 
ing-room,  dining-room,  two  bedrooms  with  their 
own  door  of  entrance  on  the  staircase — first  floor 
—  for  twenty-five  francs,  service  y  compris),  and 
gave  me  heaps  of  Boston  and  Cambridge  news. 
I  am  going  to  breakfast  with  him  at  the  Bristol 
presently.  I  called  at  the  Hotel  de  Lorraine  l  and 
met  the  Revolution  in  person.  The  whole  Hotel 
de  France  part  —  the  whole  inside  that  is  —  was  a 
heap  of  rubbish  in  the  street.  With  some  trouble 
I  penetrated  to  Madame  Guillaume,  who  led  me 
into  a  tiny  cavern  in  the  rear,  where  I  found  Ma 
dame  Garrier  transformed  into  a  cave-dweller.  I 
expected  to  hear  the  growl  of  the  ursus  speluncce, 

1  The  old  inn  at  which  he  and  the  Fields  had  formerly  stayed. 


274  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

or  whatever  they  call  him.  The  darkness  of  a 
pocket  (without  any  chink  in  it)  would  be  illumi 
nation  compared  with  it.  ...  But  Madame  was 
very  cordial.  Presently  Marie  came  in  grown  a 
tall  girl  and  with  very  pretty  manners.  I'  took 
her  out  into  the  light  and  found  her  the  image  of 
her  father.  Him  I  did  not  see.  Doubtless  he  was 
talking  politics  or  taking  snuff  with  some  gossip  or 
other  of  his.  I  remember  he  always  disappeared 
in  moments  of  crisis  like  the  repair  of  the  salle  a 
manger  which  took  place  in  my  time.  He  is  a 
singed  cat,  having  seen  two  revolutions  and  the 
Commune." 

It  was  after  his  return  to  London  that  Lowell 
was  in  the  thickest  of  the  contention  which  began 
not  long  after  his  appointment  to  the  post  of 
American  minister  and  continued  through  more 
than  half  of  his  term,  as  long,  that  is,  as  the  period 
of  acute  disturbance  of  the  relations  between  Eng 
land  and  Ireland.  Other  international  questions 
arose  during  his  term  of  service,  but  none  that 
called  for  the  exercise  of  so  much  sound  diplomatic 
discretion,  or  gave  rise  to  so  much  angry  criticism. 
Lowell's  judgment  regarding  Irish  affairs  was  not 
the  result  merely  of  what  he  now  saw  and  heard  in 
London.  No  American  who  had  followed  public 
questions  at  home  could  escape  the  formation  of 
some  opinion  respecting  the  Irish  character  and 
the  relation  in  which  Ireland  stood  to  England, 
and  through  her  emigrants  to  America.  In  1848, 
when  Smith  O'Brien,  Meagher,  and  other  Irish 
leaders  were  agitating  for  reform  through  insurrec- 


THE   ENGLISH  MISSION  275 

tion,  Lowell  commented  on  the  situation  in  one 
of  his  editorial  articles  in  the  National  Anti-Slav 
ery  Standard.  He  had  no  faith  in  the  measures 
which  these  leaders  proposed ;  he  thought  the  only 
radical  cure  for  the  evils  of  Ireland  lay  in  peasant 
proprietorship  and  education.  "The  only  perma 
nent  safeguard,"  he  writes,  "  against  famine  is  to 
give  the  people  a  deeper  interest  in  the  soil  they 
cultivate  and  the  crops  they  raise.  It  is  the  con 
stant  sense  of  insecurity  that  has  made  the  Irish 
the  shiftless  and  prodigal  people  which  they  are 
represented  to  be  by  all  travellers.  Education  will 
be  of  no  avail  unless  at  the  same  time  something 
be  given  them  on  which  they  can  bring  it  to  a 
practical  bearing.  Take  away  English  opposition 
and  the  present  insurrection  is  directed  against  — 
what  ?  We  confess  ourselves  at  a  loss  for  an 
answer.  The  only  insurrection  which  has  done 
Ireland  any  real  service  was  the  one  headed  by 
Father  Mathew.  The  true  office  of  the  Irish 
Washington  would  be  to  head  a  rebellion  against 
thriftlessness,  superstition,  and  dirt.  The  sooner 
the  barricades  are  thrown  up  against  these  the 
better.  Ireland  is  in  want  of  a  revolution  which 
shall  render  troops  less  necessary  rather  than 
more  so." 

When  Lowell  was  earnestly  opposing  the  suici 
dal  course  of  the  South  before  the  actual  outbreak 
of  the  war  for  the  Union,  secession  being  then  the 
shibboleth,  he  took  Scotland  and  Ireland  in  their 
relation  to  Great  Britain  for  parallel  historic  in 
stances  in  support  of  his  position.  "  There  is  no 


276  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

such  antipathy,"  he  wrote,  "  between  the  North  and 
the  South  as  men  ambitious  of  a  consideration  in 
the  new  republic,  which  their  talents  and  character 
have  failed  to  secure  them  in  the  old,  would  fain 
call  into  existence  by  asserting  that  it  exists.  The 
misunderstanding  and  dislike  between  them  is  not 
so  great  as  they  were  within  living  memory  be 
tween  England  and  Scotland,  as  they  are  now 
between  England  and  Ireland.  There  is  no  differ 
ence  of  race,  language,  or  religion.  Yet,  after  a 
dissatisfaction  of  near  a  century  and  two  rebel 
lions,  there  is  no  part  of  the  British  dominion  more 
loyal  than  Scotland,  no  British  subjects  who  would 
be  more  loath  to  part  with  the  substantial  advan 
tages  of  their  imperial  connection  than  the  Scotch ; 
and  even  in  Ireland,  after  a  longer  and  more 
deadly  feud,  there  is  no  sane  man  who  would  con 
sent  to  see  his  country  irrevocably  cut  off  from 
power  and  consideration  to  obtain  an  independence 
which  would  be  nothing  but  Donnybrook  Fair  mul 
tiplied  by  every  city,  town,  and  village  in  the 
island.  The  same  considerations  of  policy  and  ad 
vantage,  which  render  the  union  of  Scotland  and 
Ireland  with  England  a  necessity,  apply  with  even 
more  force  to  the  several  States  of  our  Union."  1 

When,  therefore,  Lowell  found  himself  in  Eng 
land  as  the  representative  of  the  United  States  at 
a  period  when  the  chronic  irritation  between  Eng 
land  and  Ireland  was  at  an  acute  stage  through  the 
operation  of  the  so-called  coercion  act,  it  is  not 

1  "  E  Pluribus  Unum,"  Political  Essays,  pp.  67,  68.     Printed 
first  in  the  Atlantic  Monthly,  February,  1861. 


THE   ENGLISH  MISSION  277 

surprising  that  he  should  take  a  very  lively  interest 
in  affairs.  As  a  part  of  his  diplomatic  duty,  he 
kept  his  government  informed  not  so  much  of  the 
facts  which  were  the  news  of  the  day,  as  of  the 
interpretation  to  be  put  upon  the  political  situa 
tion.  Accordingly,  on  7  January,  1881,  he  wrote 
to  Mr.  Evarts,  then  Secretary  of  State :  - 

"Seldom  has  a  session  of  Parliament  begun 
under  more  critical  circumstances.  The  abnormal 
condition  of  Ireland  and  the  question  of  what  rem 
edy  should  be  sought  for  it  have  deeply  divided 
and  embittered  public  opinion.  Not  only  has  the 
law  been  rendered  powerless  and  order  disturbed 
(both  of  them  things  almost  superstitiously  sacred 
in  England),  but  the  sensitive  nerve  of  property 
has  been  rudely  touched.  The  opposition  have 
clamored  for  coercion,  but  while  they  have  per 
sisted  in  this  it  is  clear  that  a  change  has  been 
gradually  going  on  in  their  opinion  as  to  how  great 
concessions  would  be  needful.  It  seems  now  to 
be  granted  on  all  sides  that  the  Irish  people  have 
wrongs  to  be  redressed  and  just  claims  for  rights  to 
be  granted.  I  think  that  the  government  have  at 
least  gained  so  much  by  the  expectant  and  humane 
policy  which  they  have  persevered  in  under  very 
great  difficulties,  and  in  spite  of  a  criticism  the 
more  harassing  as  it  seemed  to  have  some  founda 
tion  in  principles  hitherto  supposed  to  be  self- 
evident. 

"  Added  to  this  was  the  fact  (at  least  I  believe 
it  to  be  a  fact)  that  there  was  a  division  of  opinion 
in  the  Cabinet  itself.  This  probably  led  to  the 


278  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

one  mistake  in  policy  that  has  been  made  by  the 
prosecution  of  Mr.  Parnell  and  some  of  his  asso 
ciates  —  a  mistake,  because,  in  the  exceedingly 
improbable  contingency  of  the  jury  agreeing  to 
convict,  the  belief  will  be  universal  in  Ireland  that 
they  have  been  packed,  and  the  government  will 
have  a  dozen  martyrs  on  its  hands  of  whom  it 
would  be  at  a  loss  how  to  dispose,  —  a  half-ludi 
crous  position  which  could  not  fail  to  involve  a 
loss  of  prestige. 

"  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  Mr.  Parnell  was 
unpleasantly  surprised  by  the  land  league,  and  has 
been  compelled  to  identify  himself  with  a  move 
ment  having  other  and  more  comprehensive  (per 
haps  more  desperate)  aims  than  that  which  he 
originated.  So  far  as  can  be  judged,  a  great  deal 
of  the  agitation  in  Ireland  is  factitious,  and  large 
numbers  of  persons  have  been  driven  by  timidity 
to  profess  a  sympathy  with  it  which  they  do  not 
feel.  This,  of  course,  strengthens  the  probability 
of  its  being  possible  to  allay  it  by  generally  accept 
able  measures  of  reform.  I  am  sure  that  the  rea 
sonable  leaders  or  representatives  of  Irish  opinion 
see  the  folly  of  expecting  that  England  would  ever 
peaceably  consent  to  the  independence  of  Ireland ; 
that  they  do  not  themselves  desire  it ;  and  that  they 
would  be  content  with  a  thorough  reform  of  the 
land  laws  and  a  certain  amount  of  local  self-gov 
ernment.  Both  of  these  measures,  you  will  ob 
serve,  are  suggested  in  the  speech  from  the  throne. 
You  will  readily  divine  that  one  of  the  great  diffi 
culties  with  which  the  ministry  has  had  to  struggle 


THE   ENGLISH  MISSION  279 

has  been  the  presentiment  that  a  change  in  the 
conditions  of  land  tenure  in  Ireland  will  be  fol 
lowed  by  something  similar,  certainly  by  an  agita 
tion  for  something  similar,  on  this  side  the  Irish 
channel. 

"  The  Cabinet,  I  am  safe  in  saying,  are  earnestly 
desirous  of  doing  justice  to  Ireland,  and  not  only 
that,  but  of  so  shaping  reform  as  to  make  the  cure 
as  lasting  as  such  a  cure  can  be.  No  government 
can  consent  to  revolution  (though  this  was  deemed 
possible  in  some  quarters  as  respects  some  govern 
ments  twenty  years  ago),  but  the  present  ministry 
are  willing  to  go  all  lengths  that  are  feasible  and 
wise  in  the  way  of  reform  and  reparation.  Their 
greatest  obstacle  will  be  the  overweening  expecta 
tions  and  inconsiderate  temper  of  the  Irish  them 
selves,  both  of  them  the  result  of  artificial  rather 
than  natural  causes.  For  no  reform  will  be  effect 
ual  that  does  not  gradually  nullify  the  unhappy 
effects  produced  by  the  influence,  through  many 
generations,  of  the  pitiable  travesty  of  feudal  rela 
tions  between  landlord  and  tenant,  making  that 
relation  personal  instead  of  mercantile,  and  thus 
insensibly  debauching  both. 

"  The  condition  of  Ireland  is  not  so  disturbed 
now  as  it  has  been  at  several  periods  during  the 
last  eighty  years,  and  precisely  the  same  system  of 
organization  was  brought  to  bear  against  the  col 
lection  of  tithes  fifty  years  ago  that  has  now  been 
revived  to  resist  the  payment  of  what  are  consid 
ered  excessive  rents.  The  landlords  are  repre 
sented  as  the  minions  of  a  foreign  and  hated  domi- 


280  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

nation,  and  the  use  of  the  epithet  foreign  has  at 
least  this  justification,  that  there  is  certainly  an 
imperfect  sympathy  between  the  English  and  Irish 
characters  which  prevents  each  from  comprehend 
ing  either  the  better  qualities  of  the  other  or,  what 
is  worse,  the  manner  of  their  manifestion. 

"I  cannot  perceive  that  the  public  opinion  of 
the  country  has  withdrawn  itself  in  any  apprecia 
ble  measure  from  sympathy  with  the  Cabinet, 
though  there  is  considerable  regret  among  thought 
ful  liberals  that  coercion  should  have  been  deemed 
necessary  and  that  the  proposed  reforms  should 
not  have  gone  farther.  If  the  Irish  could  only  be 
brought  to  have  as  much  faith  in  Mr.  Gladstone 
as  he  has  desire  for  their  welfare,  there  might  be 
more  hope  than  I  can  now  see  for  a  permanent 
solution  of  the  Irish  question." 

Mr.  Evarts  acknowledged  the  despatch  with 
commendation  for  its  lucid  treatment  of  the  sub 
ject,  but  Lowell  soon  found  himself  involved  in 
something  closer  at  hand  than  academic  discussion. 
About  three  weeks  after  this  despatch,  he  had 
occasion  to  write  again  of  the  state  of  affairs,  and 
to  note  the  final  passage  of  the  so-called  coercion 
bill.  At  the  close  of  this  despatch  he  wrote : 
"  The  wild  and  whirling  words  of  some  Irishmen 
and  others  from  America  have  done  harm  to  some 
thing  more  than  the  cause  of  Irish  peasantry,  by 
becoming  associated  in  the  public  mind  with  the 
country  whose  citizenship  they  put  off  or  put  on  as 
may  be  most  convenient.  In  connection  with  this,  I 
beg  leave  to  call  your  attention  to  an  extraordinary 


THE  ENGLISH  MISSION  281 

passage  in  the  letter  of  Mr.  Parnell  to  the  Irish 
National  Land  League,  dated  Paris,  February  13, 
1881,  in  which  he  makes  a  distinction  between 
'  the  American  people '  and  *  the  Irish  nation  in 
America.'  This  double  nationality  is  likely  to  be 
of  great  practical  inconvenience  whenever  the  coer 
cion  bill  becomes  law.  The  same  actor  takes  alter 
nately  the  characters  of  a  pair  of  twins  who  are 
never  on  the  stage  simultaneously."  l 

In  his  capacity  of  critic,  Lowell  heartily  con 
demned  the  measure  taken  by  the  British  govern 
ment.  In  a  letter  to  the  American  consul  in  Cork, 
he  wrote  :  "  The  '  coercion  act,'  so-called,  is  an 
exceptional  and  arbitrary  measure.  Its  chief  ob 
ject  is  to  enable  the  authorities  to  arrest  persons 
whom  they  suspect  of  illegal  conduct,  without 
being  obliged  to  produce  any  proof  of  their  guilt. 
Its  very  substance  and  main  purpose  are  to  de 
prive  suspected  persons  of  the  speedy  trial  they 
desire.  This  law  is,  of  course,  contrary  to  the 
spirit  and  foundation  principles  of  both  English 
and  American  jurisprudence ;  but  it  is  the  law  of 
the  land  and  it  controls  all  parties  domiciled  in  the 
proclaimed  districts  of  Ireland,  whether  they  are 
British  subjects  or  not,  and  it  is  manifestly  entirely 
futile  to  claim  that  naturalized  citizens  of  the 
United  States  should  be  excepted  from  its  opera 
tion."  2 

But  Lowell  was  not  a  mere  looker-on  in  London, 
He  was  charged  with  the  very  delicate  duty  of  dis- 

1  Despatch  No.  132,  dated  26  February,  1881. 

2  Foreign  Relations,  1881,  p.  545. 


282  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

criminating  between  men  who  were  American  citi 
zens  and  innocent  of  any  infraction  of  British  laws 
and  men  who  used  the  cloak  of  naturalization, 
whether  genuine  or  pretended,  to  cover  illicit  ac 
tions  and  designs.  He  had  to  uphold  the  real  dig 
nity  of  the  American  citizen,  and  at  the  same  time 
to  avoid  entangling  his  country  and  Great  Britain 
by  an  unwary  protection  of  some  one  who  had  no 
title  to  protection.  The  cases  which  now  began 
to  succeed  each  other  with  confusing  rapidity  in 
volved  not  only  a  mass  of  correspondence  and  the 
sifting  of  evidence,  but  the  application  constantly 
of  personal  judgment,  and  the  exercise  of  much  in 
genuity  in  the  reading  of  character.  An  illustra 
tion  may  be  found  in  a  despatch  of  Lowell  to  his 
government,  dated  4  June,  1881.  After  an  ana 
lysis  of  the  political  situation,  he  says :  — 

"  I  think  that  the  necessity  of  a  radical  and 
prompt  reform  in  the  relations  of  landlord  and 
tenant  in  Ireland  is  forcing  conviction  into  the 
mind  of  even  the  Conservative  Party,  though  the 
violence  of  language  and  the  incitement  to  violence 
of  action  on  the  part  of  those  who  claim  to  be  the 
true  friends  of  Ireland  are  doing  much  to  endanger 
the  success  of  remedial  measures. 

"  Among  the  most  violent  are  often  the  Irish 
men  who  have  been  naturalized  in  America,  and 
then  gone  back  to  Ireland  with  the  hope,  and 
sometimes,  I  am  justified  in  saying,  with  the  de 
liberate  intention,  of  disturbing  the  friendly  rela 
tions  between  the  United  States  and  England. 
Such  a  one  called  upon  me  the  other  day.  His 


THE  ENGLISH  MISSION  283 

name  was ,  naturalized  in  1875  at  Baltimore, 

and  going  over  to  Ireland  immediately  after  on 
the  plea  that  his  health  could  not  resist  the 
American  climate.  He  is  now  at  least  a  remark 
ably  robust  and  florid  man.  He  told  me  that  he 
was  a  draper  in  Charleville,  County  Cork,  and 
hearing  that  a  warrant  was  out  for  his  arrest,  he 
had  come  over  to  London  to  claim  my  protection. 
He  had  been  acting  as  treasurer  of  the  Land 
League  in  that  place.  He  professed  not  to  know 
on  what  grounds  the  warrant  had  been  issued,  but 
I  satisfied  myself  in  the  course  of  our  conversa 
tion  that  he  knew  perfectly  well  it  was  for  sedi 
tious  language  and  incitement  to  violence.  He 
favored  me  with  a  good  deal  of  this  sort  of  rhetoric 
with  a  manner  that  implied  no  earnestness  of  con 
viction,  and  as  if  repeating  something  he  had 
learned  by  rote.  He  several  times  repeated  that 
the  '  best  thing  would  be  a  war  between  England 
and  the  United  States.'  After  hearing  this  man's 
talk,  my  belief  was  that  he  had  purposely  exposed 
himself  to  the  chances  of  arrest  in  the  hope  of 
adding  to  the  difficulties  of  the  government.  I 
asked  him  if  he  had  considered  the  enormous  in 
terests  at  stake,  quite  apart  from  any  moral  con 
sideration,  and  that  England  was  our  greatest 
customer  for  cattle,  corn,  and  cotton  ?  He  merely 
repeated  what  he  had  said  before  as  to  the  de 
sirability  of  war.  declared  that  he  meant 

to  return  to  America  whenever  his  health  would 
permit,  but  admitted  that  it  would  take  at  least 
five  years  to  wind  up  his  business,  and  I  think  his 


284  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

intention  may  fairly  be  questioned.  As  he  de 
clared  himself  ready  to  be  quiet  for  the  future  if 
not  arrested,  I  thought  it  prudent  to  mention  his 
name  unofficially  to  Lord  Granville,  and  to  suggest 
that  the  warrant  should  not  be  put  in  force  unless 
further  offence  were  given. 

"  I  have  spoken  at  some  length  of  his  case,  be 
cause  I  think  it  of  some  importance  that  the  De 
partment  should  be  informed  as  to  the  kind  of 
persons  who  may  ask  its  intervention,  and  as  to 
the  doctrines  they  preach.  Under  ordinary  cir 
cumstances  they  would  be  harmless,  and  are  made 
mischievous  only  by  the  excited  state  of  the  coun 
try.  My  own  judgment  is  that  the  ministry  have 
gone  to  the  extreme  limit  of  public  opinion  in 
their  concessions  to  Irish  necessities  ;  that  they  are 
perfectly  honest  in  their  desire  to  be  generously 
just ;  and  that  the  best  friends  of  Ireland  are  not 
those  who,  however  sincerely,  throw  obstacles  in 
their  way.  The  real  cure,  which  I  believe  to  be  a 
larger  measure  of  Home  Rule,  will  be  made  easier 
by  the  better  state  of  things  which,  in  the  opinion 
of  those  best  competent  to  judge,  is  likely  to  result 
from  the  passage  of  the  Land  Bill." 

In  the  early  stages  of  what  proved  to  be  a  long 
and  vexatious  series  of  Irish- American  cases,  Low 
ell  laid  down  a  course  of  action  which  he  seems  to 
have  adhered  to  consistently.  The  United  States 
consul  at  Dublin  had  on  his  hands  a  case  which 
was  especially  troublesome,  because  the  claim  of 
the  arrested  man  to  American  protection  rested  on 
statements  of  citizenship  which  were  contradictory, 


THE   ENGLISH  MISSION  285 

and  created  naturally  a  suspicion  as  to  the  validity 
of  the  claim.  After  cautioning  the  consul  to  make 
certain  enquiries,  he  adds:  "If  the  fact  of  his 
American  citizenship  should  thus  be  ascertained 
to  your  satisfaction,  I  desire  then  that  you  should 
carefully  examine  into  the  grounds  of  his  arrest, 
and  if  the  precise  facts  justify  the  belief  that  no 
substantial  charge  of  his  complicity  with  treason 
able  or  seditious  objects  can  be  made  out,  you 
will  communicate  this  to  the  authorities  in  Ireland 
and  request  his  discharge  or  to  be  informed  why 
he  is  detained.  You  will  please  intimate,  in  re 
spectful  terms  and  without  any  warmth  or  sugges 
tion  of  threats,  that  you  are  making  these  enquiries 
under  my  instructions,  and  are  acting  precisely 
as  British  consuls  in  the  United  States  acted  soon 
after  the  civil  war,  under  the  directions  of  the  Brit 
ish  minister  at  Washington,  in  cases  of  summary 
arrests  of  British  subjects.  It  is  my  duty  to  pro 
tect,  so  far  as  I  can,  all  citizens  of  the  United 
States,  whether  native  or  naturalized,  who  are 
shown  to  be  innocent  of  designs  to  subvert  civil 
order,  and  I  should  not  perhaps  require  in  such 
cases  evidence  of  innocence  so  full  and  conclusive 
as  that  which  might  be  required  in  a  court  of  law. 
At  the  same  time  I  shall  by  no  means  try  to  screen 
any  persons  who  are  evidently  guilty  of  offending 
against  the  criminal  laws  of  Great  Britain." 

Mr.  Blaine,  who  had  succeeded  Mr.  Evarts  as 
Secretary  of  State,  on  being  advised  of  Lowell's 
action  in  this  case,  wrote  that  it  received  "  the  en 
tire  commendation  of  the  Department  as  discreet 


286  JAMES   RUSSELL   LOWELL 

and  proper."  And  a  few  weeks  later,  as  the  case 
became  somewhat  more  involved,  he  wrote  again : 
"The  prudence  you  have  shown  in  dealing  with 

's  claim  to  citizenship  is  commendable,  and 

the  statements  as  to  the  law  in  his  case,  made  in 
your  letters  to  him,  are  in  full  accord  with  the 
interpretation  of  this  Department."  Mr.  Elaine 
then  laid  down  instructions  to  meet  certain  hypo 
thetical  cases,  and  not  long  after  had  occasion  to 
call  Lowell's  attention  to  another  apparent  act 
of  injustice  in  the  arrest  of  a  naturalized  Ameri 
can  citizen.  The  friends  of  the  man  in  America 
had  besieged  Mr.  Elaine  in  his  behalf,  and  Mr. 
Elaine  wrote  an  eloquent  despatch  to  Lowell,  in 
which  he  said  :  "  If  American  citizens  while  within 
British  jurisdiction  offend  against  Eritish  laws, 
this  government  will  not  seek  to  shield  them 
from  the  legal  consequences  of  their  acts,  but  it 
must  insist  upon  the  application  to  their  cases  of 
those  common  principles  of  criminal  jurisprudence 
which  in  the  United  States  secure  to  every  man 
who  offends  against  its  laws,  whether  he  be  an 
American  citizen  or  a  foreign  subject,  those  inci 
dents  to  a  criminal  prosecution  which  afford  the 
best  safeguard  to  personal  liberty  and  the  strongest 
protection  against  oppression  under  the  forms  of 
law,  which  might  otherwise  be  practised  through 
excessive  zeal." 

Lowell  replied  somewhat  dryly  :  "  It  will  give 
me  great  pleasure  to  communicate  to  Lord  Gran- 
ville  the  views  you  have  so  clearly  and  eloquently 
expressed  as  to  the  injustice  of  some  of  the  fea- 


THE   ENGLISH  MISSION  287 

tures  of  the  so-called  c  Protection  act,' 1  and  espe^ 
cially  its  retroactive  character.  But  I  would 
respectfully  suggest  whether  any  step  would  be 

gained  toward  the  speedy  trial  or  release  of  

by  an  argument  against  the  law  itself  under  which 
he  was  apprehended.  So  long  as  Lord  Granville 
expressly  declines  to  make  any  distinction  between 
British  subjects  and  American  citizens  in  the  ap 
plication  of  this  law,  a  position  which  I  presume 
may  be  justified  by  precedents  in  our  own  diplo 
matic  history,  I  submit  to  your  better  judgment 
whether  the  only  arguments  I  can  use  in  favor  of 

must  not  be  founded  upon  some  exceptional 

injustice  in  the  way  in  which  he  has  been  treated. 
If  this  shall  appear  by  the  report  of  the  consul  to 
have  been  practised,  I  shall  press  for  his  trial  or 
release  with  great  earnestness.  Bat  if  it  shall  be 
shown  that  he  has  experienced  no  more  harshness 
than  the  majority  of  his  fellow-prisoners  have  suf 
fered,  I  do  not  feel  by  any  means  sure  that  your 
instructions  would  authorize  me  to  make  any  spe 
cial  application  on  his  behalf."  Lowell  finally 
secured  the  release  of  the  man  by  pointing  out  that 
his  health  was  suffering  by  his  imprisonment,  and 
it  is  not  unlikely  that  Lord  Granville  was  glad  of 
so  good  an  excuse  to  remove  one  of  the  perplexities 
by  which  his  government  was  embarrassed. 

The   whole    unhappy  business    may  be    said  to 
have  been  at  its  height  when,  in  February,  1882, 

1  The  title  of  the  act,  called  sometimes  the  "  coercion  "  some 
times  the  "  protection  "  act,  was  "  An  act  for  the  better  protection 
of  person  and  property  in  Ireland." 


288  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

a  resolution  of  the  House  of  Kepresentatives  called 
upon  the  President  for  detailed  information  re 
specting  the  arrest  of  American  citizens  in  Ireland. 
The  State  Department  accordingly  called  on  the 
American  minister  in  London  to  furnish  this  infor 
mation,  and  in  his  despatch  dated  14  March,  1882, 
Lowell  recounts  all  the  cases  which  up  to  that 
time  had  come  under  his  notice,  with  all  the  corre 
spondence  relating  thereto.  There  were  ten,  and 
the  number  was  increased  by  a  few  more  before 
the  business  was  settled.  At  the  close  of  the  de 
spatch,  enumerating  the  ten  cases,  Lowell  says  very 
pertinently  :  — 

"  I  may  be  permitted  to  add  that  I  have  had 
repeated  assurances  from  the  highest  authority 
that  there  would  be  great  reluctance  in  arresting 
a  naturalized  citizen  of  the  United  States  were  he 
known  to  be  such.  But  it  is  seldom  known,  and 
those  already  arrested  have  acted  in  all  respects  as 
if  they  were  Irishmen,  sometimes  engaged  in  trade, 
sometimes  in  farming,  and  sometimes  filling  posi 
tions  in  the  local  government.  This  I  think  is  illus 
trated  by  a  phrase  in  one  of  Mr. 's  letters,  to 

the  effect  that  he  never  called  himself  an  Ameri 
can.  He  endeavors,  it  is  true,  in  a  subsequent 
letter,  to  explain  this  away  as  meaning  American 
born  ;  but  it  is  obviously  absurd  that  a  man  living 
in  his  native  village  should  need  to  make  any  such 
explanation.  Naturalized  Irishmen  seem  entirely 
to  misconceive  the  process  through  which  they  have 
passed  in  assuming  American  citizenship,  looking 
upon  themselves  as  Irishmen  who  have  acquired 


THE  ENGLISH  MISSION  289 

a  right  to  American  protection,  rather  than  as 
Americans  who  have  renounced  a  claim  to  Irish 
nationality." 

It  is  not  surprising  that  the  whole  affair  caused 
much  fury  of  words  both  in  Congress  and  out.  An 
organization  existed  which  was  bent  on  making  all 
the  trouble  it  could  for  the  British  government, 
and  there  was  still  plenty  of  political  capital  in 
Irish  wrongs.  A  great  mass-meeting  was  held 
in  New  York  at  which  Lowell  was  denounced 
severely,  and  from  this  time  till  his  return  from 
England  every  opportunity  was  taken  by  a  certain 
class  of  men  to  sneer  at  him  for  what  they  were 
pleased  to  regard  as  his  apostasy  from  American 
principles.  He  was  defended,  however,  both  in 
Congress  and  in  the  press.  His  course  was  well 
summed  up  in  an  editorial  article,  in  which  the 
writer  says :  — 

"  Mr.  Lowell,  who  has  been  denounced  by  Mr. 
Kandall  for  his  '  sickening  sycophancy  to  English 
influence,'  has  treated  the  matter  not  as  an  Eng 
lish,  Irish,  or  American  question,  but  purely  as  a 
point  of  international  law.  He  has  had  no  sympa 
thy  with  the  coercion  legislation,  and  has  even 
taken  pains  to  characterize  it  as  exceptional  and 
arbitrary.  .  .  .  That  law  [the  4  protection '  law] 
legalized  the  arrest  of  the  suspects  in  districts 
where  the  writ  of  habeas  corpus  had  been  sus 
pended,  and  where  the^  natives  were  not  allowed  the 
privilege  of  a  jury  trial.  To  have  demanded  their 
unconditional  release,  when  no  discrimination  had 
been  made  between  them  and  the  natives,  would 


290  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

have  been  an  open  affront  to  a  friendly  power. 
What  Mr.  Lowell  did  was  to  follow  the  best  pre 
cedents  of  criminal  jurisdiction  in  international 
cases,  several  of  which  had  been  established  during 
the  American  civil  war,  when  British  subjects  were 
arbitrarily  arrested  and  denied  the  privilege  of 
trial.  At  the  same  time,  he  has  conducted  the 
negotiations  with  the  Foreign  Office  with  so  much 
tact  and  decision  that  we  are  inclined  to  expect  a 
speedy  clearance  of  the  Irish  jails  from  suspects 
whose  citizenship  in  the  United  States  is  authen 
ticated."  And  the  next  day  the  same  journal 
said :  "  Mr.  Lowell's  negotiations  for  the  release 
of  the  Irish-American  suspects  have  been  crowned 
with  partial  success.  Before  the  mass-meeting  at 
Cooper  Institute  disgraced  itself  by  heaping  re 
proaches  upon  him,  the  Department  of  State  had 
received  official  information  that  all  but  three  of 
these  prisoners  had  been  set  at  liberty  in  response 
to  the  request  of  the  United  States  minister.  .  .  . 
Mr.  Frelinghuysen l  reports  that  the  negotiations 
have  been  carried  on  between  the  two  governments 
for  some  time  '  in  a  spirit  of  entire  friendship.'  This 
result  had  been  promoted  by  the  cordial  relations 
existing  between  Lord  Granville  and  Mr.  Lowell. 
The  fact  that  our  government  has  been  represented 
in  these  negotiations  by  one  of  our  foremost  men 
of  letters  has  been  a  most  fortunate  circumstance. 
Mr.  Lowell  had  won  the  respect  and  admiration  of 
the  best  men  in  English  public  life,  and  when  he 

1  Mr.  Frelinghuysen  Lad  succeeded  Mr.  Elaine  as  Secretary  of 
State. 


THE   ENGLISH   MISSION  291 

came  to  plead  for  these  suspects  his  personal  char 
acter  and  popularity  were  of  direct  service  to  them. 
.  .  .  Mr.  Lowell  made,  as  our  cable  despatches 
have  stated,  every  effort  consistent  with  diplomatic 
usage,  and  at  the  same  time  performed  a  most 
delicate  duty  with  such  consummate  tact  as  to 
remove  all  sources  of  irritation."  1 

The  whole  situation  was  plainly  one  that  called 
for  great  tact,  and  for  that  delicate  use  of  language 
in  which  the  shadows  of  words  are  not  to  be  left 
out  of  account.  It  was  probably  with  reference  to 
this  particular  encounter  that  the  London  Spec 
tator  said  shortly  after  Lowell's  death :  "  There 
was  a  question  at  one  time  whether  the  late  Lord 
Granville  or  Mr.  Lowell  were  the  more  accom 
plished  and  subtle  in  conveying,  without  offence, 
the  suggestion  or  conviction  which  it  might  be  the 
duty  of  either  of  them  to  impress  on  any  one  to 
whom  the  communication  might  not  be  welcome. 
And  probably  this  is  a  point  which  would  be  very 
differently  determined  by  different  people.  But 
though  equal  in  courtesy  and  grace  of  manner  to 
Lord  Granville,  we  should  say  that  Mr.  Lowell 
had  the  greater  power  of  the  two  to  impress  his 
meaning,  even  where  it  was  a  meaning  painful  and 
difficult  to  enforce,  without  conveying  even  the 
slightest  tincture  of  personal  discourtesy.  Lord 
Granville  was  perhaps  even  fuller  of  the  suaviter 
in  modo,  but  Mr.  Lowell  never  forgot  the  neces 
sity,  where  the  necessity  existed,  of  conveying  also 
the  impression  of  thefortiter  in  re.  With  all  his 
1  The  New  York  Tribune,  5,  6  April,  1882. 


292  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

grace,  there  was  a  plainness  of  purpose  in  him 
which  could  not  be  mistaken."  l 

Lowell  himself,  writing  to  Dr.  Holmes  shortly 
before  leaving  England,  recalls  the  situation  and 
says :  "  Some  of  my  Irishmen  had  been  living  in 
their  old  homes  seventeen  years,  engaged  in  trade 
or  editing  nationalist  papers,  or  members  of  the 
poor-law  guardians  (like  MacSweeney),  and  neither 
paying  taxes  in  America  nor  doing  any  other  duty 
as  Americans.  I  was  guided  by  two  things  —  the 
recognized  principles  of  international  law,  and  the 
conduct  of  Lord  Lyons  when  Seward  was  arresting 
and  imprisoning  British  subjects.  We  kept  one 
man  in  jail  seven  months  without  trial  or  legal 
process  of  any  kind,  and,  but  for  the  considerate- 
ness  and  moderation  of  Lyons,  might  have  had 
war  with  England.  I  think  I  saved  a  misunder 
standing  here.  .  .  .  When  I  had  at  last  procured 
the  conditional  (really  unconditional)  release  of  all 
the  suspects,  they  refused  to  be  liberated.  When 
I  spoke  of  this  to  Justin  McCarthy  (then  the  head 
of  the  Irish  Parliamentary  party,  Parnell  being  in 
Kilmainham),  he  answered  cheerfully,  '  Certainly  : 
they  are  there  to  make  trouble.'  " 2  One  of  the 
intimations  of  what  lay  in  his  mind  throughout  all 
the  delicate  business  may  be  read  in  a  note  to  Mr. 
John  W.  Field,  19  January,  1884 :  "  I  wonder,  by 
the  way,  when  we  shall  see  an  American  politician 
able  to  appreciate  and  shrewd  enough  to  act  on 
Curran's  saying  about  his  countrymen,  that  'an 

1  The  Spectator,  15  August,  1891. 

2  Letters,  ii.  293,  294. 


THE  ENGLISH  MISSION  293 

Irishman  is  the  worst  fellow  in  the  world  to  run 
away  from.' " 

And  after  his  return  to  America,  he  wrote  to 
Lady  Lyttelton :  "  You  must  make  up  your  mind 
to  let  Ireland  have  her  head.  She  may  no  doubt 
choose  to  go  over  a  precipice,  though  I  don't  think 
that  she  would,  and  at  any  rate  a  whole  legion  of 
devils  would  go  with  her  as  with  the  Gadarene 
swine ;  at  best  it  is  all  up  playing  Sisera,  for  the 
stars  in  their  courses  are  rather  beyond  reach  even 
of  the  newspapers."  That  Lowell  had  a  keen  ap 
preciation  of  the  genuine  spirit  of  patriotism  which 
moved  the  Irish  in  America  in  his  generation  may 
be  discerned  by  any  one  who  will  read  the  closing 
sentences  in  his  address  on  "  The  Independent  in 
Politics." 

Mr.  Theodore  Watts-Dunton  in  an  article 1  pub 
lished  just  after  Lowell's  death,  tried  to  sum  up 
his  intellectual  qualities  in  a  word,  and  thought  he 
found  the  expression  in  "  sagacity."  "  In  life,"  he 
says,  "  his  most  striking  characteristic  —  a  charac 
teristic  indicated  not  only  by  the  watchful  gray 
eyes  and  the  apparently  conscious  eyebrows  that 
overshadowed  them,  but  in  every  intonation  of  his 
voice,  and  every  movement  of  his  limbs  —  was  a 
marvellous  sagacity."  "  What  is  called  his  wit," 
he  adds,  "is  merely  this  almost  preternatural  sa 
gacity  in  rapid  movement.  What  is  called  his 
humor  is  this  same  sagacity  at  rest  and  in  a  med 
itative  mood."  Without  pushing  this  analysis 
so  far,  there  is  no  doubt  that  in  his  diplomatic 

1  The  Athenccum,  22  August,  1891. 


294  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

capacity  Lowell  did  draw  upon  his  native  genius 
for  quick  perception  and  interpretation.  The  gift 
which  he  had  multiplied  by  use  in  the  criticism  of 
literature  and  in  the  diagnosis  of  political  situa 
tions  at  home,  was  at  his  service  both  in  Madrid 
and  London.  It  made  him  not  a  mere  fencer  in  a 
diplomatic  game,  but  a  man  of  resources  in  the 
serious  representation  of  his  country's  interests. 
That  he  could  couch  his  demands  or  protests  in 
witty  phrase  added  to  his  power  of  persuasion; 
and  he  could  not  associate  as  an  equal  with  Eng 
lish  statesmen  without  applying  his  sagacity  to 
their  problems  even  where  these  did  not  immedi 
ately  concern  his  own  people.  Perhaps  it  was  after 
Majuba  that  he  wrote  in  one  of  his  despatches : 
"  I  asked  Lord  Lyons  whether  he  did  not  think 
suzerainty  might  be  defined  as  '  leaving  to  a  man 
the  privilege  of  carrying  the  saddle  and  bridle 
after  you  have  stolen  his  horse.'  He  assented." 

There  was,  perhaps,  something  in  the  adjust 
ment  of  Lowell  to  his  surroundings  which  set  the 
springs  of  poetry  flowing  intermittently.  At  any 
rate,  he  was  content,  conscious  that  he  was  of  ser 
vice  in  a  high  position,  happy  both  in  his  own 
health  —  "I  have  never  seen  a  climate  that  suited 
me  so  well,"  he  wrote  —  and  in  his  wife's  improve 
ment,  and  surrounded  by  congenial  companions. 
These  things  do  not  necessarily  make  for  poetry, 
but  Lowell  had  by  this  time  come  into  that  mel 
low  stage  when  what  he  did  had  about  it  an  ab 
sence  of  apparent  effort,  when  his  ripe  experience 


THE   ENGLISH  MISSION  295 

and  equipoise  of  life  found  easy  expression,  and 
poetry  was  a  solace  and  a  pastime.  To  be  sure, 
there  is  something  to  make  one  smile  behind  his 
hand  when  one  sees  the  American  minister  sending 
his  "  Phcebe"  across  the  Atlantic  and  following  it 
with  almost  daily  corrections,  yet  one  listens  to  the 
note  with  the  feeling  that  the  poet  is  putting  into 
the  reminiscence  of  a  far-off  sound  not  a  little  of 
his  present  apprehension  of  himself.  Nay,  the 
poem  in  its  first  form  broke  at  last  into  two  stan 
zas,  wisely  omitted  in  the  final  recension,  which 
are  almost  bald  in  their  apologetic  confession :  — 

"  Let  who  has  felt  compute  the  strain 

Of  struggle  with  abuses  strong, 
The  doubtful  course,  the  helpless  pain 
Of  seeing  best  intents  go  wrong. 

"  We  who  look  on  with  critic  eyes 

Exempt  from  action's  crucial  test, 
Human  ourselves,  at  least  are  wise 
In  honoring  one  who  did  his  best." 

On  New  Year's  Day,  1882,  Lowell  sent  another 
poem,  "  Estrangement,"  to  Mr.  Gilder  for  the  Cen 
tury.  "  I  am  pleased,"  he  wrote,  "  that  you  liked 
the  little  poem  I  sent  you,  and  the  more  that  you 
asked  for  another.  Here  is  one  you  are  welcome 
to,  if  you  like  it.  I  rather  do,  but  that  is  nothing, 
and  I  shall  like  you  none  the  less  if  you  don't. 
Treat  me  like  a  gentleman  and  not  like  a  poet,  — 
I  mean  as  you  would  a  gentleman  and  not  a  poet. 
I  am  tough  and  have  myself  played  Herod  to  many 
an  infant  muse,  —  and  mine  is  approaching  her 
second  childhood." 


296  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

His  social  life  drew  from  him  occasional  verses, 
as  when  he  planted  a  tree  at  Inverary,  or  thanked 
Miss  Dorothy  Tennant,  who  afterward  married 
Henry  M.  Stanley,  for  a  drawing  of  little  street 
Arabs,  or  sent  a  sonnet  home  in  honor  of  Whit- 
tier's  seventy-fifth  birthday,  or  gave  a  posset  cup 
to  a  god-child.  He  was  happy  in  pleasing  young 
friends  with  verses,  sometimes  inserting  them  in 
books  which  he  gave  them,  or  writing  them  in 
their  albums. 

Early  in  1882  he  was  saddened  by  the  sudden 
death  of  R.  H.  Dana,  one  of  the  earliest  of  his 
friends  and  lately  fresh  in  his  recollection  since  he 
had  seen  much  of  him  in  his  recent  stay  in  Rome. 
"  We  had  known  each  other,"  he  wrote  to  Mr. 
George  Putnam,  "  at  least  fifty-five  years.  He 
is  a  great  loss,  and  the  more  that  his  career  was 
incomplete.  He  never  filled  the  place  he  ought 
in  public  affairs.  One  weakness  neutralized  the 
legitimate  effect  of  his  very  remarkable  abilities. 
Death  seems  to  be  hitting  right  and  left  among 
my  contemporaries.  So  far  as  I  am  concerned,  I 
take  the  warning  with  perfect  equanimity."  It 
was  somewhat  in  the  same  mood  that  he  wrote  to 
his  friend  Field  :  "  I  have  no  news  except  that  for 
about  a  week  I  have  been  having  a  head  again.  I 
have  temporarily  reformed  and  live  cleanly  like 
Falstaff.  No  wine,  no  black  coffee,  and  —  you 
won't  believe  it,  but  't  is  true  —  no  baccy  till  after 
noon  and  then  a  short  allowance.  You  see  I  am 
in  earnest.  At  the  same  time  that  I  take  these 
precautions  I  confess  that  I  don't  hanker  arter 


THE   ENGLISH   MISSION  297 

much  more  of  this  world,  and  shouldn't  mind 
much  if  — .  I  notice  that  the  men  in  my  platoon 
are  dropping  right  and  left.  I  wish  I  relished  life 

as  much  as  you.  Give  my  love  to ,  who  will 

see  by  the  way  I  spell  her  name  that  I  am  in  good 
humor  though  I  feel  as  if  I  had  Luke's  iron  crown 
on."' 

He  was  drawn  in  colored  chalks  at  this  time  by 
Mr.  Sandys,  and  another  portrait  also  was  painted 
by  Mrs.  Merritt,  which  now  hangs  in  the  Faculty 
Room  in  University  Hall  at  Harvard.  "  I  am  off 
for  private  view  at  Academy,"  he  writes  to  Mr. 
Field,  28  April,  1882;  "two  portraits  of  myself 
there.  They  are  very  unlike  each  other,  and  my 
duty  to  the  artist  requires  me  to  try  and  look  as 
much  like  each  as  I  can.  What  am  I  to  do  ? 
They  will  be  in  different  rooms  doubtless,  and  so  I 
can  manage  it  perhaps." 

It  was  a  light  matter  to  toy  with  verse  now  and 
then,  but  as  for  prose,  the  most  he  attempted  be 
yond  his  despatches  to  his  government  were  the 
speeches  he  made  now  and  then.  Mr.  Aldrich 
had  asked  for  a  paper  on  a  certain  subject  for  the 
Atlantic,  and  he  replied,  8  May,  1882 :  "  If  I 
could,  how  gladly  I  would !  But  I  am  piece- 
mealed  here  with  so  many  things  to  do  that  I  can 
not  get  a  moment  to  brood  over  anything,  as  it 
must  be  brooded  over  if  it  is  to  have  wings.  It 
is  as  if  a  setting  hen  should  have  to  mind  the  door 
bell.  Now,  you  must  wait  till  I  come  home  to  be 
Boycotted  in  my  birthplace  by  my  Irish  fellow- 
citizens  (who  are  kind  enough  to  teach  me  how  to 


298  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

be  American)  who  fought  all  our  battles  and  got 
up  all  our  draft-riots.  Then,  in  the  intervals  of 
firing  through  my  loopholes  of  retreat  I  may  be 
able  to  do  something  for  the  Atlantic.  I  am  now  in 
the  midst  of  the  highly  important  and  engrossing 
business  of  arranging  for  the  presentation  at  Court 
of  some  of  our  fair  citoyeiines.  Whatever  else  you 
are,  never  be  a  minister  !  "  Mr.  Bowker  relates  of 
Lowell  that  "  at  one  time  he  had  given  offence  to 
an  American  lady  of  doubtful  reputation,  who  had 
asked  him  to  present  her  at  Court,  and  on  his  dex 
terously  evading  that  responsibility,  had  asked  him 
point  blank  whether  he  was  unwilling  because  he 
had  heard  certain  things  about  her.  He  could  not 
answer  in  the  negative,  and  she  went  off  vowing 
vengeance.  A  few  months  afterwards,  when  the 
Irish  criticisms  were  hottest,  she  reappeared  and 
had  the  effrontery  to  tell  him  that  she  had  stirred 
up  the  whole  business  herself,  out  of  revenge.  Mr. 
Lowell  added,  on  telling  this  story,  that  he  pro 
posed  to  accomplish  at  least  one  thing,  to  keep  his 
country  respectable,  even  if  he  had  to  resign  to 
do  it." 

One  of  the  most  admirable  of  his  little  speeches 
was  that  on  unveiling  the  bust  of  Fielding  at  Taun- 
ton,  4  September,  1883.  He  spoke  as  an  author,  as 
one  who  had  reflected  upon  the  great  office  of  lit 
erature,  and  as  a  critic  who  could  measure  Field 
ing's  power  by  the  standard  of  Shakespeare  and 
Cervantes,  and  perhaps  even  more  effectively  as 
one  of  the  English  race  who  was  enough  differ 
entiated  by  his  American  birth,  and  enough  in- 


THE   ENGLISH  MISSION  299 

structed  by  his  familiarity  with  racy  men  of  the 
soil,  to  appreciate  the  essential  English  manliness 
of  the  great  writer.  This  address  is  indeed  one  of 
the  most  striking  commentaries  on  the  fitness  of 
Lowell  to  act  as  a  spokesman  for  the  common  Eng- 
lishry  of  two  countries.  His  point  of  view  was  at 
once  that  of  an  onlooker  and  of  one  indigenous. 

O 

Three  years  later,  when  reprinting  the  address  in 
his  volume  "  Democracy  and  other  Addresses,"  he 
refers  to  one  passage  in  the  speech  as  follows  :  "  I 
am  constantly  bothered  by  the  disenchanting  effect 
of  my  sense  of  humor  (of  which  I  speak  in  the 
Fielding  address)  which  makes  me  too  fair  to  both 
sides.  This  often  makes  me  distrustful  of  myself. 
I  am  sometimes  inclined  to  call  Genius  not  '  an 
infinite  capacity  for  taking  pains  '  (though  that  is 
much),  but  an  infinite  capacity  for  being  one 
sided." 

There  was  a  somewhat  humorous  episode  in  Low 
ell's  career  in  the  autumn  of  1883.  It  is  a  time- 
honored  custom  at  the  ancient  and  sturdy  little 
University  of  St.  Andrews  for  the  student  body  to 
elect  once  a  year  a  Lord  Rector  of  the  University 
whose  duties  are  limited  to  a  single  address.  There 
is  a  tacit  understanding  that  politics  shall  not 
enter  into  the  election,  and  that  the  choice  shall  be 
the  students'  own,  without  interference  from  the 
officers  of  the  faculty.  This  does  not  of  course 
preclude  an  interest  on  the  part  of  professors,  and 
Shairp,  Campbell,  and  Baynes  especially  took  a 
lively  interest  in  the  proposal  that  Lowell  should 
succeed  Sir  Theodore  Martin.  At  first  Mr.  Mai- 


300  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

lock  appeared  as  opposition  candidate,  but  his 
name  was  withdrawn  when  it  was  found  that  he 
had  been  set  up  by  some  indiscreet  person  with  a 
view  to  bettering  his  chances  for  Parliament,  and 
the  Right  Hon.  Edward  Gibson  was  proposed.  A 
protest  was  lodged  against  Lowell's  nomination  on 
the  ground  that  he  was  an  alien.  The  whole  busi 
ness  created  a  lively  discussion  in  and  out  of  print, 
and  Punch  entered  the  lists  with  these  lines  :  — 

"  An  alien  ?     Go  to  !     If  fresh,  genial  wit 
In  sound  Saxon  speech  be  not  genuine  grit, 
If  the  wisdom  and  mirth  he  has  put  into  verse  for  us 
Don't  make  him  a  '  native,'  why,  so  much  the  worse  for  us. 
Whig,  Tory,  and  Rad  should  club  votes,  did  he  need  'em, 
To  honor  the  writer  who  gave  Bird  o1  Freedom 
To  all  English  readers.     A  few  miles  of  sea 
Make  Lowell  an  alien  ?     Fiddle-de-dee  ! 
'T  is  crass  party  spirit,  Boeotian,  dense, 
That  is  alien  indeed  —  to  good  taste  and  good  sense." 

The  excitement  ran  high,  and  Lowell  was  elected 
by  a  considerable  majority.  But  his  opponents 
pushed  the  matter  further,  and  demonstrated  that 
he  was  really  ineligible  by  reason  of  his  "  extra 
territoriality."  As  Lowell  put  it  in  writing  to 
Professor  Child :  "  My  official  extra-territoriality 
will,  perhaps,  prevent  my  being  rector  at  St.  An 
drews,  because  it  puts  me  beyond  the  reach  of  the 
Scottish  Courts  in  case  of  malversation  in  office. 
How  to  rob  a  Scottish  University  suggests  a  seri 
ous  problem."  To  avoid  further  complications 
Lowell  resigned.  He  good-humoredly  told  his 
friends  at  home  that  his  only  regret  was  in  being 
prevented  from  adding  the  dignified  line  "  Univ. 


THE   ENGLISH  MISSION  301 

Sanct.  Andr-Scot-Dom.  Eect."  to  his  name  in  the 
Harvard  catalogue.  His  student  friends  could 
do  nothing  but  accept  the  situation.  Later,  they 
begged  him,  when  they  knew  he  was  to  be  at  St. 
Andrews,  to  address  them  unofficially.  It  was  not 
long  before  the  expiration  of  his  term  as  American 
minister,  and  he  wrote,  27  January,  1885  :  — 

"  Circumstances  over  which  I  have  no  control 
will  prevent  my  being  with  you  at  St.  Andrews 
next  Friday.  I  feel  deeply  touched  by  the  contin 
ued  kindness  of  the  students  of  your  ancient  Uni 
versity,  and  greatly  honored  by  their  wish  to  see 
me  and  hear  me.  I  am  somewhat  consoled  in  my 
disappointment  by  the  reflection  that  neither  your 
eyes  nor  your  ears  will  lose  so  much  as  is  kindly 
implied  by  the  invitation  with  which  you  have  hon 
ored  me.  It  is  I  who  miss  a  pleasure  whose  loss 
I  shall  always  regret ;  for  young  friends  have  a 
charm  and  value  of  their  own,  as  he  feels  most  sen 
sibly  who  has  reached  a  period  in  life  when  old 
ones  are  only  too  frequently  saying  good-by  for 
ever." 

When  the  commotion  over  the  rectorship  was 
going  on,  Lowell  was  having  a  holiday  in  Paris, 
where  he  was  able  to  take  Mrs.  Lowell  for  a  couple 
of  months.  An  anonymous  writer  in  the  Atlantic 
Monthly?  who  saw  the  Lowells  at  this  time,  has 
recorded  some  impressions  created  by  Lowell's  con 
versation,  and  among  them  one  respecting  his  in 
terest  in  the  Jewish  race.  When  he  was  writing 
his  paper  on  Rousseau,  his  interest  was  awakened, 

1  January,  1897.     "  Conversations  with  Mr.  Lowell." 


302  JAMES  RUSSELL   LOWELL 

and  the  interest  took  a  personal  turn  as  he  asso 
ciated  his  own  family  name  of  Russell  with  that  of 
the  French  philosopher.  He  was  led  to  enquire 
into  the  representation  of  the  race  in  America,  and 
no  doubt  his  interest  was  heightened  by  his  sojourn 
in  Spain.  But  it  was  after  he  went  to  England, 
where  he  had  manifold  opportunities  for  making 
observations,  that  the  whole  subject  of  the  Jewish 
element  in  society  came  to  be  a  very  frequent 
topic  of  conversation  with  him.  It  was  just  such 
a  subject  as  would  appeal  to  his  love  of  paradox, 
his  subtle  curiosity,  and  his  liking  for  brilliant 
forays  into  new  territory.  It  does  not  appear  that 
Lowell  ever  set  down  in  writing  his  deliberate  con 
victions.  Rather  he  kept  this  theme  for  the  pas 
time  of  conversation,  driving  the  ball  indeed  at 
times  with  an  energy  which  would  suggest  the  pro 
fessional  athlete. 

"  One  evening,"  says  the  writer  in  the  Atlantic, 
"  I  was  dining  with  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Lowell  and 
three  other  friends,  and  he  began  to  lament  the 
renaming  of  old  streets  which  was  going  on,  and 
the  obliteration  of  the  last  traces  of  the  Paris  of 
the  twelfth  and  thirteenth  centuries,  —  the  Paris 
of  the  schoolmen  and  their  open-air  debates.  He 
spoke  of  the  local  history  that  lay  in  the  mere 
names  of  streets  and  squares,  —  Rue  du  Fouarre, 
Rue  des  Gauvais  Gar^ons,  and  several  more  of 
which  he  gave  the  origin  and  legend.  In  the  midst 
of  this  picturesque  and  learned  disquisition  he 
stumbled  upon  the  class  of  a  celebrated  philosopher 
of  those  times,  seated  on  their  bundles  of  straw,  — 


THE   ENGLISH   MISSION  303 

a  well-known  teacher  whose  name   I  cannot  now 
recall,  —  and  stated  that  he  was  a  Jew. 

"  He  instantly  began  to  talk  of  the  Jews,  a  sub 
ject  which  turned  out  to  be  almost  a  monomania 
with  him.  He  detected  a  Jew  in  every  hiding- 
place  and  under  every  disguise,  even  when  the 
fugitive  had  no  suspicion  of  himself.  To  begin 
with  nomenclature :  all  persons  named  for  coun 
tries  or  towns  are  Jews ;  all  with  fantastic,  com 
pound  names,  such  as  Lilienthal,  Morgenroth  ;  all 
with  names  derived  from  colors,  trades,  animals, 
vegetables,  minerals ;  all  with  Biblical  names,  ex 
cept  Puritan  first  names  ;  all  patronymics  ending 
in  sow,  —  sohn,  sen,  or  any  other  version  ;  all  Rus- 
sels,  originally  so  called  from  red-haired  Israelites ; 
all  Walters,  by  long  descended  derivation  from 
wolves  and  foxes  in  some  ancient  tongue ;  the 
Caecilii,  therefore  Cecilia  Metella,  no  doubt  St. 
Cecilia  too,  consequently  the  Cecils,  including  Lord 
Burleigh  and  Lord  Salisbury ;  he  cited  some  old 
chronicle  in  which  he  had  cornered  one  Robert  de 
Caecilia  and  exposed  him  as  an  English  Jew.  He 
gave  examples  and  instances  of  these  various  classes 
with  amazing  readiness  and  precision,  but  I  will 
not  pretend  that  I  have  set  down  even  these  few 
correctly.  Of  course  there  was  Jewish  blood  in 
many  royal  houses  and  in  most  noble  ones,  notably 
in  Spain.  In  short,  it  appeared  that  this  insidious 
race  had  penetrated  and  permeated  the  human 
family  more  universally  than  any  other  influence 
except  original  sin.  He  spoke  of  their  talent  and 
versatility,  and  of  the  numbers  who  had  been  illus- 


304  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

trious  in  literature,  the  learned  professions,  art, 
science,  and  even  war,  until  by  degrees,  from  being 
shut  out  of  society  and  every  honorable  and  desir 
able  pursuit,  they  had  gained  the  prominent  posi 
tions  everywhere. 

"  Then  he  began  his  classifications  again :  all 
bankers  were  Jews,  likewise  brokers,  most  of  the 
great  financiers,  —  and  that  was  to  be  expected  ;  the 
majority  of  barons,  also  baronets  ;  they  had  got 
possession  of  the  press,  they  were  getting  into  poli 
tics  ;  they  had  forced  their  entrance  into  the  army 
and  navy ;  they  had  made  their  way  into  the  cabi 
nets  of  Europe  and  become  prime  ministers ;  they 
had  slipped  into  diplomacy  and  become  ambassa 
dors.  But  a  short  time  ago  they  were  packed  into 
the  Ghetto  :  now  they  inhabited  palaces,  the  most 
aristocratic  quarters,  and  were  members  of  the 
most  exclusive  clubs.  A  few  years  ago  they  could 
not  own  land  ;  they  were  acquiring  it  by  purchase 
and  mortgage  in  every  part  of  Europe,  and  buying 
so  many  old  estates  in  England  that  they  owned 
the  larger  part  of  several  counties. 

"  Mr.  Lowell  said  more,  much  more,  to  illustrate 
the  ubiquity,  the  universal  ability  of  the  Hebrew, 
and  gave  examples  and  statistics  for  every  state 
ment,  however  astonishing,  drawn  from  his  inex 
haustible  information.  He  was  conscious  of  the 
sort  of  infatuation  which  possessed  him,  and  his 
dissertation  alternated  between  earnestness  and 
drollery ;  but  whenever  a  burst  of  laughter  greeted 
some  new  development  of  his  theme,  although  he 
joined  in  it,  he  immediately  returned  to  the  charge 


THE   ENGLISH   MISSION  305 

with  abundant  proof  of  his  paradoxes.  Finally  he 
came  to  a  stop,  but  not  to  a  conclusion,  and  as  no 
one  else  spoke,  I  said,  '  And  when  the  Jews  have 
got  absolute  control  of  finance,  the  army  and  navy, 
the  press,  diplomacy,  society,  titles,  the  govern 
ment,  and  the  earth's  surface,  what  do  you  suppose 
they  will  do  with  them  and  with  us  ? '  '  That,' 
he  answered,  turning  towards  me,  and  in  a  whisper 
audible  to  the  whole  table,  'that  is  the  question 
which  will  eventually  drive  me  mad.' ' 

On  the  return  of  the  Lowells  from  Paris  to 
London  they  moved  into  a  larger  and  more  com 
modious  house  still  in  Lowndes  Square,  but  No. 
31.  "  We  have  been  having  a  mild  winter,"  Lowell 
writes  to  Mr.  Field,  19  January,  1884,  "  with  only 
a  couple  of  days  or  so  of  frost  thus  far.  Every 
thing  is  looking  as  green  as  summer  (by  every 
thing  I  mean  the  grass  in  the  Parks)  and  the 
thrushes  are  using  up  all  their  best  songs  before 
the  curtain  of  spring  rises.  The  Season  has  n't 
begun  yet,  but  I  am  dining  out  more  or  less  as 
usual.  Fanny  goes  too  sometimes,  but  can't  stand 
much  of  it.  You  will  have  seen  that  I  have 
resigned  my  rectorship,  but  I  was  at  once  chosen 
president  of  the  Birmingham  and  Midland  Insti 
tute  so  that  I  might  have  another  chair  to  sit 
down  in." 

It  was  in  the  double  office  of  American  minister 
and  poet  that  he  took  part  in  the  ceremonies  at 
tending  the  unveiling  of  the  bust  of  Longfellow  in 
Westminster  Abbey,  2  March,  1884.  But  the  per 
sonal  relation  which  he  bore  the  poet  was  upper- 


306  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

most  in  his  mind,  especially  as  he  was  renewing 
his  intercourse  with  the  family  in  the  person  of  two 
of  Longfellow's  daughters  who  were  living  in  Eng 
land  at  this  time  and  were  present  at  the  unveil 
ing.  The  occasion  was  not  one  for  critical  judg 
ment,  but  in  the  course  of  his  brief  speech  he  made 
a  felicitous  point  on  sonnet  writing.  "  I  have  been 
struck  particularly,"  he  said,  "  with  this  quality 
of  style  in  some  of  my  late  friend's  sonnets,  which 
seem  to  me  in  unity  and  evenness  of  flow  among 
the  most  beautiful  and  perfect  we  have  in  the  lan 
guage.  They  remind  one  of  those  cabinets  in 
which  all  the  drawers  are  opened  at  once  by  the 
turn  of  the  key  in  a  single  lock,  whereas  we  all 
have  seen  sonnets  with  a  lock  in  every  line  with  a 
different  key  to  each,  and  the  added  conundrums 
of  secret  drawers." 

In  April  came  the  tercentenary  commemoration 
3>f  the  University  of  Edinburgh,  when  Lowell  was 
present  and  received  the  degree  of  Doctor  of  Laws. 
The  same  degree  was  conferred  on  him  at  his  own 
University  a  few  weeks  later. 

In  May  he  was  called  on  for  two  addresses.  On 
the  seventh  of  the  month  he  attended  the  annual 
dinner  of  the  Provincial  Newspaper  Society  at  the 
Inns  of  Court  Hotel,  London,  and  a  few  words 
which  he  then  said,  because  spoken  apparently 
without  premeditation,  are  worth  recording  as  ex 
pressing  a  judgment  held  by  him  with  great  sin 
cerity.  "  I  have  my  own  theory,"  he  said,  "  as  to 
what  after-dinner  speaking  should  be.  I  think  it 
should  be  in  the  first  place  short ;  I  think  it  should 


THE  ENGLISH   MISSION  307 

be  light ;  and  I  think  it  should  be  both  extempo 
raneous  and  contemporaneous.  I  think  it  should 
have  the  meaning  of  the  moment  in  it,  and  nothing 
more.  But  I  confess  that  when  I  get  up  here  and 
face  you,  representing  what  you  call  the  Provincial 
Press  —  and  if  you  will  allow  me  by  way  of  an 
interjection,  I  may  state  that  it  has  been  my  for 
tune  to  live  in  a  number  of  countries,  where  it  has 
sometimes  been  my  duty  to  study  the  National 
Press,  and  I  have  always  and  everywhere  found  it 
provincial:  I  have  never  yet  encountered  a  truly 
cosmopolitan  newspaper  —  when  I  feel  myself  stand 
ing  for  the  first  time  in  the  presence  of  a  collection 
of  editors,  I  experience  a  very  serious  emotion.  I 
feel  as  if  I  were  talking  to  the  ear  of  Dionysius,  at 
the  other  end  of  which  the  world  was  listening.  I 
do  not  see  any  reporters  here  —  I  am  glad  I  do  not. 
I  cannot  help  taking  this  opportunity,  with  so  many 
persons  who  have  the  formation  of  public  opinion 
before  me,  of  saying  one  or  two  words  on  the  grow 
ing  change  which  has  taken  place  in  the  methods 
of  forming  public  opinion.  I  am  not  sure  that  you 
are  always  aware  to  how  great  an  extent  you  have 
supplanted  the  pulpit,  to  how  great  an  extent  you 
have  supplanted  even  the  deliberative  assembly. 
You  have  assumed  responsibilities,  I  should  say, 
heavier  than  man  ever  assumed  before.  You  wield 
an  influence  entirely  without  precedent  hitherto  in 
human  history.  I  do  not  wish  the  dinner  to  be  too 
solemn,  but,  as  I  tell  you,  I  have  been  solemnized 
standing  in  this  presence.  I  carne  here  intending 
only  to  say  a  few  words  of  kindly  thanks  for  the 


308  JAMES   RUSSELL   LOWELL 

friendliness  which  you  have  shown  toward  the  coun 
try  I  have  the  honor  to  represent,  and  to  me  as 
representing  it.  .  But,  I  cannot  forbear  to  say  that, 
if  I  were  an  editor,  I  should  have  written  up  in  the 
room  in  which  I  write,  '  Woe  to  me  if  I  preach  not 
the  gospel : '  I  mean  so  much  of  the  Word  of  God 
as  is  manifest  to  me,  and  I  should  strive  to  preach 
that  word,  and  to  convey  it  to  my  fellow-men.  I 
have  always  thought  the  case  of  clergymen  a  hard 
one,  because  they  are  expected  to  be  inspired  once 
a  week.  But  what  is  this  to  yours  who  must  be 
inspired  every  day,  and  who  have  undertaken  to 
edit  the  whole  world  every  morning  ?  There  has 
been  nothing,  as  I  was  just  saying,  that  has,  in  the 
history  of  man,  occupied  such  a  position  as  the 
Press.  You  have  the  formation  of  public  opinion. 
There  is  not  a  man  here  who  values  any  more  than 
I  do,  or  ever  have  done,  the  opinion  of  Tom,  or  the 
opinion  of  Dick,  or  the  opinion  of  Harry.  But 
when  Tom,  Dick,  and  Harry  agree,  then  we  begin 
to  call  it  public  opinion.  I  am  not  sure  that  it 
always  deserves  that  name  ;  but  I  am  sure  of  this, 
that  public  opinion  is  of  value  in  precise  proportion 
to  the  material  it  is  made  of.  I  am  sure  of  this, 
that  two  factors  go  towards  the  making  of  that 
material.  One  is  the  editor,  and  the  other  is  the 
reader." 

•  Three  days  later,  10  May,  1884,  he  delivered,  as 
president  of  the  Wordsworth  Society,  the  address 
on  that  poet  which  is  included  in  his  "  Literary 
and  Political  Addresses."  He  deprecated  the  no 
tion  that  he  could  add  materially  to  what  he  had 


THE  ENGLISH  MISSION  309 

written  of  Wordsworth  in  his  more  deliberate 
earlier  paper,1  for  as  he  says :  "  Without  unbroken 
time  there  can  be  no  consecutive  thought,  and  it 
is  my  misfortune  that  in  the  midst  of  a  reflection 
or  of  a  sentence  I  am  liable  to  be  called  away  by 
the  bell  of  private  or  public  duty."  The  speech 
contains  one  or  two  critical  passages  which  may 
be  added  to  the  sum  of  Lowell's  comment  on 
Wordsworth ;  but  to  the  student  of  Lowell's  mind 
as  affected  by  new  conditions  and  registering  itself 
in  new  terms,  the  speech  is  more  interesting  be 
cause  of  the  main  thought  in  it,  that  which  occu 
pies  him  upon  passing  in  review  the  work  of  Dr. 
Knight  who  had  by  his.  new  edition  of  the  poet 
enabled  the  student  to  perceive  more  clearly  the 
development  of  Wordsworth's  thought.  Precisely 
that  examination  which  we  are  desirous  of  making 
of  Lowell,  Lowell  set  out  to  make  of  Wordsworth ; 
but  the  eye  of  the  student  reveals  something  of  the 
mind  that  prompts  the  eye's  excursion,  and  Lowell 
was  in  a  way  suggesting  the  movement  of  his  own 
thought  when,  upon  enquiring  what  was  the  solu 
tion  by  which  Wordsworth  attempted  as  he  grew 
in  years  to  justify  his  own  early  radicalism  with 
his  later  conservatism,  he  found  a  very  powerful 
influence  in  that  religious  conception  which  domi 
nated  Wordsworth's  later  thought.  "I  see  no 
reason  to  think,"  he  says,  "  that  he  ever  swerved ) 
from  his  early  faith  in  the  beneficence  of  freedom, 
but  rather  that  he  learned  the  necessity  of  defining 
more  exactly  in  what  freedom  consisted,  and  the 

1  Literary  Essays,  iv. 


310  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

conditions,  whether  of  time  or  place,  under  which 
alone  it  can  be  beneficent,  of  insisting  that  it  must 
be  an  evolution  and  not  a  manufacture,  and  that  it 
should  coordinate  itself  with  the  prior  claims  of 
society  and  civilization."  But  the  roots  of  freedom 
were  planted  in  the  individual  nature,  and  there 
they  were  to  be  nourished.  Development  of  char 
acter  —  yes,  but  by  what  means  ?  "  Observation 
convinced  him  that  what  are  called  the  safeguards 
of  society  are  the  staff  also  of  the  individual  mem 
bers  of  it;  that  tradition,  habitude,  and  heredity 
are  great  forces,  whether  for  impulse  or  restraint. 
He  had  pondered  a  pregnant  phrase  of  the  poet 
Daniel,  where  he  calls  religion  '  mother  of  Form 
and  Fear.'  A  growing  conviction  of  its  profound 
truth  turned  his  mind  towards  the  church  as  the 
embodiment  of  the  most  potent  of  all  traditions, 
and  to  her  public  offices  as  the  expression  of  the 
most  socially  humanizing  of  all  habitudes." 

Lowell  was  analyzing  Wordsworth's  poetry  with 
a  view  to  reaching  definite  understanding  of  the 
principles  which  prompted  it,  and  especially  which 
led  to  the  gradual  yet  none  the  less  sure  change 
in  the  philosophy  of  the  poetry.  I  think  in  the 
whole  interesting  discussion  which  Lowell  here 
entered  upon  one  may  read  his  own  mind,  more  or 
less  conscious  of  change  in  its  attitude  and  finding 
in  the  mirror  of  another  poet  some  image  of  itself. 
In  becoming  wonted  to  English  life,  Lowell  was 
lessening  a  certain  protest  against  institutional  reli 
gion  which  was  characteristic  of  the  community 
into  which  he  was  born,  and  had  been  a  part  of  his 


THE  ENGLISH   MISSION  311 

own  intellectual  and  moral  expression.  In  a  letter 
to  Mrs.  Herrick  written  in  1875,  he  had  answered 
a  question  of  hers  regarding  his  religious  faith  :  — 

"  You  ask  me  if  I  am  an  Episcopalian.  No, 
though  I  prefer  the  service  of  the  Church  of  Eng 
land,  and  attend  it  from  time  to  time.  But  I  am 
not  much  of  a  church-goer,  because  I  so  seldom  find 
any  preaching  that  does  not  make  me  impatient 
and  do  me  more  harm  than  good.  I  confess  to  a 
strong  lurch  towards  Calvinism  (in  some  of  its  doc 
trines)  that  strengthens  as  I  grow  older.  Perhaps 
it  may  be  some  consolation  to  you  that  my  mother 
was  born  and  bred  an  Episcopalian." 

In  this  passage  Lowell  betrays  very  naturally 
his  New  England  mind.  He  inherited  the  pre 
vailing  notion  that  the  Episcopal  Church  was  an 
exotic,  —  he  speaks  of  attending  the  service  of  the 
Church  of  England,  when  he  probably  is  thinking 
of  his  occasional  visits  with  his  daughter  to  Christ 
Church  in  his  own  Cambridge  ;  and  he  could  not 
help  looking  upon  the  sermon  as  the  central  point 
in  religious  worship.  But  the  preference  which  he 
had  for  the  service  was  easily  strengthened  by  asso 
ciation  with  it  where  it  was  the  rule  and  not  the 
exception  ;  not  only  so,  but  that  observation  which 
ne  used  so  keenly  showed  him  in  England  the 
existence  of  a  highly  organized  society,  very  con 
genial  to  him,  in  which  not  only  was  church-going 
a  matter  of  course,  but  religion  as  a  spirit  was  not 
dissociated  from  the  forms  of  worship,  rather  it 
was  thought  of  largely  in  those  terms.  Hence  it 
was  that  Lowell  in  adjusting  himself  as  he  did  to 


312  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  life  about  him  was  undergoing  more  or  less 
conscious  a  change  in  the  attitude  of  his  mind 
toward  the  whole  field  of  religion. 

To  some  this  would  seem  an  indication  that 
Lowell  was  becoming  Anglicized.  But  how  confi 
dently  could  this  be  asserted  of  his  political  faith  ? 
That  was  a  very  integral  part  of  his  nature.  From 
youth  to  age  he  had  declared  and  reiterated  his 
faith  in  freedom,  in  the  largest  liberty,  and  espe 
cially  in  that  political  equality  which  was  the  basis 
of  all  that  was  holiest  and  most  enduring  in  the 
America  of  which  he  was  so  passionate  a  lover,  — 
the  America  which  he  saw  in  a  vision,  and  was 
able  to  see  even  through  the  vapors  which  might 
rise  from  mephitic  ground.  When  the  autumn  of 
1884  came,  the  political  signs  pointed  to  a  change 
of  party  in  the  administration  of  government  at 
home,  and  in  the  event  of  an  accession  to  power 
of  the  Democratic  party,  it  was  plain  that  Lowell 
would  be  recalled  from  his  post  as  minister  near 
the  Court  of  St.  James.  Four  years  of  friendly 
intercourse  with  Englishmen  and  Englishwomen, 
of  a  somewhat  more  intimate  acquaintance  with 
the  springs  of  government  than  falls  to  the  lot 
of  the  mere  looker-on ;  not  only  that,  but  the 
advantage  which  an  alienated  American  has  of 
viewing  his  country  from  a  new  vantage  ground, 
for  distance  in  space  has  some  of  the  properties  of 
distance  in  time,  and  an  American  in  Europe  has 
almost  the  point  of  view  of  an  American  of  the 
next  century,  —  all  this  may  well  have  led  Lowell 
to  reflect  on  the  fundamentals  of  politics,  and  have 


' 


THE  ENGLISH  MISSION  313 

served  to  give  point  to  his  reflections  when  he  came 
to  give  the  address  expected  of  the  incoming  pre 
sident  of  the  Birmingham  and  Midland  Institute. 
Moreover,  the  place  where  he  was  to  speak  re 
minded  him  of  that  great  industrial  factor  which 
enters  so  powerfully  into  modern  conceptions  of 
the  state. 

It  is  fair,  therefore,  to  take  his  address  on  De 
mocracy,  given  6  October,  1884,  as  a  careful  and 
deliberate  expression  of  his  political  faith.  1  Yet 
it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  he  was  somewhat 
hampered  by  his  official  position  as  well  as  in 
spired  by  it.  He  stood  for  the  great  democratic 
country,  was  its  spokesman,  but  he  was  not  speak 
ing  to  his  own  countrymen,  and  might  easily  be 
misconstrued  by  foreigners  if  he  attempted  to 
weigh  Democracy  in  balances  designed  for  apothe 
caries'  stuff,  and  not  for  hay  wagons.  As  he  him 
self  said  four  years  later :  "  I  was  called  upon  to 
deliver  an  address  in  Birmingham,  and  chose  for  my 
theme  c  Democracy.'  In  that  place  I  felt  it  incum 
bent  on  me  to  dwell  on  the  good  points  and  favor 
able  aspects  of  democracy  as  I  had  seen  them 
practically  illustrated  in  my  native  land.  I  chose 
rather  that  my  discourse  should  suffer  through  in 
adequacy  than  run  the  risk  of  seeming  to  forget 
what  Burke  calls  '  that  salutary  prejudice  called 
our  country,'  and  that  obligation  which  forbids  one 
to  discuss  family  affairs  before  strangers.  But 
here  among  ourselves  it  is  clearly  the  duty  of  who 
ever  loves  his  country  to  be  watchful  of  whatever 
weaknesses  and  perils  there  may  be  in  the  practi- 


314  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

cal  working  of  a  system  never  before  set  in  motion 
under  such  favorable  auspices,  or  on  so  large  a 
scale."  ! 

One  need  not  be  nicer  than  his  author,  and  it  is 
clear  from  what  Lowell  wrote  afterward  that  he 
was  somewhat  surprised  at  the  importance  attached 
to  this  utterance  at  Birmingham.  In  truth,  it  was 
the  natural  and  in  a  measure  the  unstudied  expres 
sion  of  a  man  whose  convictions  were  not  lightly 
held,  had  been  tested  by  long  experience,  and 
were  the  warp  and  woof  of  his  political  loom. 
Studied  the  address  was,  so  far  as  it  became  him 
not  to  disregard  his  official  self,  and  above  all  not 
to  suffer  his  creed  to  be  modified  by  his  surround 
ings  ;  but,  bating  all  this,  the  speech  was  the  mel 
low  judgment  of  a  man  who  was  about  to  retire 
from  a  post  where  he  had  been  an  intermediary  be 
tween  the  two  freest  nations  on  earth,  and  it  repre 
sented  his  deliberate  thought  upon  the  foundations 
of  that  freedom. 

He  strikes  the  keynote  of  his  discourse  in  his 
opening  sentence  :  "  He  must  be  a  born  leader  or 
misleader  of  men,  or  must  have  been  sent  into 
the  world  unfurnished  with  that  modulating  and 
restraining  balance-wheel  which  we  call  a  sense  of 
humor,  who,  in  old  age,  has  as  strong  a  confidence 
in  his  opinions  and  in  the  necessity  of  bringing  the 
universe  into  conformity  with  them  as  he  had  in 
youth."  Here  was  Lowell,  not  unmindful  of  the 
zeal  of  his  youth,  standing  up  in  the  serenity  of 

1  "  The  Place  of  the  Independent  in  Politics,"  in  Literary  and 
Political  Addresses. 


THE  ENGLISH  MISSION  315 

age  and  about  to  repeat  his  credo  in  accents  which 
could  not  be  the  self-same  as  those  with  which 
he  had  early  sung.  Wherein,  then,  does  "  Demo 
cracy  "  disclose  essential  agreement  with  its  au 
thor's  ardent  faith  in  youth,  or  departure  from  the 
ideals  then  enjoyed  ?  The  one  note  always  struck 
by  Lowell  when  he  was  singing  of  freedom  and 
democracy  was  that  of  the  impregnable  defence  of 
these  great  truths  in  free  and  conscience-governed 
character,  and  it  is  this  note  with  which  his  address 
concludes  :  "  Our  healing  is  not  in  the  storm  or  in 
the  whirlwind,  it  is  not  in  monarchies,  or  aristocra 
cies,  or  democracies,  but  will  be  revealed  by  the 
still  small  voice  that  speaks  to  the  conscience  and 
the  heart,  prompting  us  to  a  wider  and  wiser  hu 
manity."  And  in  testing  current  views  by  his 
unalterable  faith  in  humanity,  he  cleaves  with  no 
uncertain  stroke.  At  the  time  of  his  address 
Henry  George's  doctrine  was  preached  by  its  most 
eloquent  expounder,  Henry  George  himself,,  and 
Lowell  says  frankly :  "  I  do  not  believe  that  land 
should  be  divided  because  the  quantity  of  it  is  lim 
ited  by  nature,"  but  a  moment  after,  "  Mr.  George 
is  right  in  his  impelling  motive  ;  right,  also,  I  am 
convinced,  in  insisting  that  humanity  makes  a  part, 
by  far  the  most  important  part,  of  political  eco 
nomy."  So,  too,  he  distinguishes  at  once  between 
a  socialism  which  means  "  the  practical  application 
of  Christianity  to  life,  and  has  in  it  the  secret  of 
an  orderly  and  benign  reconstruction,"  and  State 
Socialism,  whose  disposition  is  to  "cut  off  the 
very  roots  in  personal  character  —  self-help,  fore- 


316  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

thought,  and  frugality  —  which  nourish  and  sustain 
the  trunk  and  branches  of  every  vigorous  common 
wealth." 

What  strikes  one  as  most  final  in  this  discourse 
as  an  exponent  of  Lowell's  attitude  is  his  thinking 
through  to  the  substance  of  things  and  his  indiffer 
ence  to  names  or  to  terms  except  as  they  define 
realities.  "  Democracy  in  its  best  sense,"  he  de 
clares,  "  is  merely  the  letting  in  of  light  and  air." 
He  never  did  believe  in  violent  changes ;  in  his 
most  ardent  crusade  against  the  gigantic  evil  of 
slavery,  he  refused  to  go  with  his  associates  who 
were  ready  to  sever  a  union  which  seemed  to  pro 
tect  slavery.  But  with  growing  age  it  may  be  said 
that  he  was  more  averse  to  any  change  except  that 
which  was  scarcely  perceptible  at  any  one  moment 
of  its  progress.  "  Things  in  possession,"  he  says, 
"  have  a  very  firm  grip,"  and  I  think  the  whole 
address  is  tinged  with  a  sense  of  inertia,  almost  of 
weariness,  even  though  it  rises  to  moments  of  fine 
courage  and  the  expression  of  an  unshaken  faith. 
Was  this  anything  more  than  the  brooding  tone  of 
a  man  who  after  all  his  experience  was  unques 
tionably  a  man  of  thought  rather  than  a  man  of 
affairs  ? 

The  election  of  Cleveland  to  the  presidency 
made  it  clear  that  Lowell  was  to  bring  to  a  close 
his  diplomatic  life  in  England,  though  some  of  his 
friends  both  there  and  in  America  clung  to  the 
illusion  that  the  light  way  in  which  he  wore  the 
party  dress  might  make  it  possible  for  a  Democratic 
president  to  retain  in  office  a  man  who  had  made 


THE   ENGLISH  MISSION  317 

himself  so  acceptable.  Some  even  went  so  far  as 
to  see  in  such  a  policy  the  initiation  of  a  new 
course  in  administration,  by  which  ambassadors 
and  ministers  representing  -the  United  States 
should  hold  their  appointments  irrespective  of 
change  of  party  in  administration,  since  the  for 
eign  policy  of  the  government  was  practically  con 
tinued  on  the  same  line,  whichever  party  was  in 
power.  Shortly  before  the  election  Lowell  wrote 
to  Mr.  Norton  :  "  I  follow  your  home  politics  with 
a  certain  personal  interest.  The  latest  news  seems 
favorable  to  Elaine.  I  suppose  in  either  event  I 
am  likely  to  be  recalled,  and  I  should  not  regret  iti 
but  for  two  reasons, — certain  friendships  I  have' 
formed  here,  and  the  climate,  which  is  more  kindlyf 
to  me  than  any  I  ever  lived  in.  It  is  a  singularly 
manly  climate,  full  of  composure  and  without  wo 
manish  passion  and  extravagance."  After  the 
election  he  wrote  to  the  same  friend  :  "  As  for  my 
self,  my  successor  was  already  named,  and  the 
place  promised  him  in  case  of  Elaine's  election. 
This  I  knew  long  ago,  and  I  cannot  quite  make  up 
my  mind  whether  it  is  my  weakness  of  good-nature 
and  laissez-faire  that  makes  me  willing  to  stay,  or 
a  persuasion  of  what  is  best  for  me.  Everybody 
here  is  so  continually  lamenting  my  departure  that 
I  dare  say  my  judgment  is  n't  worth  much  in  the 
matter.  My  position  is  complicated  in  two  ways, 
—  the  necessity  of  engaging  a  house,  and  now  by 
Mabel's  intention  of  coming  abroad  for  some  time 
with  her  children.  This  would  change  the  aspect 
of  things  entirely,  for  they  are  naturally  the  strong- 


318  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

est  magnets  that  draw  me  homewards.  If  she 
come,  I  may  stay,  whatever  Cleveland  thinks 
best."  To  Mr.  Field  he  wrote,  11  December, 
1884  :  "  We  are  well  and  waiting  to  hear  our  fate. 
I  should  be  indifferent  but  for  a  few  friendships 
here.  All  England  is  writing  to  express  regret. 
But  I  am  old  enough  to  think  that  they  will  sur 
vive  the  loss  of  me.  .  .  .  Fanny  is  better  than  at 
any  time  since  she  left  Spain,  and  quite  willing  to 
stay  here  now  that  the  chances  are  against  it.  But 
she  will  not  believe  that  anybody  would  recall  me ! 
She  does  n't  know  the  depths  of  human  depravity." 

So  wonted  had  Lowell  become  to  his  English 
surroundings  that  some  of  his  friends  in  England 
laid  plans  to  keep  him  with  them,  and  sounded  him 
as  to  his  willingness  to  be  nominated  for  the  pro 
fessorship  of  English  language  and  literature  which 
had  lately  been  established  in  Oxford.  "  Had  he 
consented  to  stand,"  says  an  editorial  article  in  the 
London  Times,1  "not  even  a  Board  determined 
to  sink  Literature  in  Philology  could  have  passed 
over  his  claims.  But  he  declined  for  two  reasons. 
There  were  claims  of  family  over  in  Massachusetts ; 
and,  greatly  as  he  loved  the  mental  atmosphere  of 
England,  he  thought  it  his  duty  not  to  accept  a 
definitely  English  post.  And  the  sense  of  duty  is 
strong  in  that  old  Puritan  stock  from  which  he 
sprang." 

But  there  came  an  event  which  made  all  specu 
lation  regarding  his  plans  vain  and  illusory.  On 
1  13  August,  1891. 


Mrs.  Frances  Dunlap  Lowell 


320  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Mrs.  Smalley,  and  Mrs.  Stephen.     Lady  L.  has 
been  all  that  the  tenderest  sister  could  be. 
God  bless  you,  dear  old  friends  ! 
Good-by,  affectionately  yours, 

J.  R.  LOWELL. 

To  an  old  and  attached  friend  of  his  wife  he 
wrote  :  "  You  will  have  a  sad  pleasure  in  knowing 
that  she  suffered  no  pain.  In  her  last  conscious 
ness  when  I  asked  her  if  she  suffered,  she  shook 
her  head.  But  I  cannot  write  about  these  things 
coolly,  and  hate  to  j)ut  jsentiment  on  paper  where 
*  it  lacks  the  witness  of  sincerity  which  the  voice 
carries  with  it.  And  yet  I  am  glad  to  write  to  you 
who  knew  how  noble  she  was.  You  knew  also  her 
goodness  and  perfect  faith,  and  are  as  sure  as  I 
am  that  she  sees  God." 

In  fulfilling  a  wish  of  his  wife,  Lowell  wrote  to 
his  old  friend,  Mrs.  W.  W.  Story,  31  March :  "  I 
send  you  General  Wallace's  book  by  to-day's  post. 
It  was  touchingly  characteristic  that  I  should  find 
it  on  her  writing-desk  done  up  and  addressed  to 
you.  She  never  forgot  or  neglected  a  duty.  But, 
not  knowing  the  requirements  of  the  Post  Office, 
she  had  closed  it  at  both  ends,  and  sealed  it.  So  I 
was  obliged,  much  to  my  regret,  to  have  it  done  up 
in  the  right  way.  But  I  ordered  her  original  ad 
dress  to  be  left  inside  that  it  might  show  she  had 
not  forgotten. 

"  I  am  on  the  whole  glad  to  be  rid  of  my  official 
trammels  and  trappings.  I  do  not  know  yet  when 
my  successor  will  arrive,  but  hardly  look  for  him 


THE  ENGLISH  MISSION  321 

before  July.  I  shall  then  go  home,  but  whether 
to  stay  or  not  will  be  decided  after  I  have  looked 
about  me  there.  If  I  decide  to  stay  I  shall  cer 
tainly  visit  the  Old  World  pretty  regularly,  and 
shall  be  sure  to  turn  up  in  Rome." 

Lowell  added  one  more  to  his  public  addresses 
before  leaving  England,  that  delivered  on  unveil 
ing  the  bust  of  Coleridge,  in  Westminster  Abbey, 
7  May,  1885.  It  is  a  slight,  graceful  performance, 
but  in  it  I  think  we  may  hear  now  and  then  that 
echo  of  his  own  thought  about  himself  which  we 
have  more  than  once  caught  in  his  addresses,  as 
when  he  says :  "  His  critical  sense  rose  like  a  for 
bidding  apparition  in  the  path  of  his  poetic  produc 
tion  ;  "  and  again  :  "  We  are  here  to-day  not  to 
consider  what  Coleridge  owed  to  himself,  to  the 
family,  or  to  the  world,  but  what  we  owe  to  him. 
Let  us  at  least  not  volunteer  to  draw  his  frailties 
from  their  dread  abode.  Our  own  are  a  far  more 
profitable  subject  of  contemplation.  Let  the  man 
of  imaginative  temperament,  who  has  never  pro 
crastinated,  who  has  made  all  that  was  possible  of 
his  powers,  cast  the  first  stone.'' 

Early  in  June,  1885,  Lowell  left  England,  that 
held  his  wife's  grave,  and  returned  lonely  to  his 
old  home. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

RETURN   TO   PRIVATE   LIFE 

1885-1888 

ELMWOOD  was  let,  and  if  it  had  been  vacant 
Lowell  could  hardly  have  gone  back  there  at  once 
to  live.  There  were  too  many  ghosts  in  the  house, 
he  said.  He  made  no  attempt  to  take  up  again 
his  college  work,  though  he  held  his  title  of  Smith 
Professor  with  emeritus  added,  and  as  his  daughter 
had  abandoned  her  plan  of  taking  her  children 
abroad,  he  made  his  home  with  her  at  Deerfoot 
Farm,  Southborough,  Massachusetts,  about  two 
hours  by  rail  from  Boston,  in  a  pretty  country 
where  there  was  little  intrusion  of  manufactures. 
He  always  had  also  a  home  in  Boston  at  the  house 
of  his  sister,  Mrs.  Putnam.  He  was  at  once  be 
sieged  with  invitations  from  many  friends ;  as  he 
wrote  to  Mr.  Gilder  :  "  I  have  been  all  these  days 
in  the  condition  of  a  bird  of  Paradise,  unable  to 
perch,  no  matter  I  might  wish  it,  and  perhaps  em 
barrassed  by  the  number  of  friendly  roosts  offered 
to  my  choice  —  yours  not  the  least  seductive  among 
them."  He  made  up  his  mind  to  attend  the  Com 
mencement  at  Harvard,  though  he  dreaded  both 
the  heat  and  the  emotion,  —  as  he  wrote :  "  O  for 
a  good  freezing  English  July  day !  "  He  found 


RETURN   TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  323 

himself  deluged  with  letters  —  it  was  almost  as 
bad  as  in  London.  Many  he  was  unaMe  to  an 
swer,  many  answered  themselves  after  Napoleon's 
easy-going  philosophy,  but  with  the  return  to  pri 
vate  life  and  in  the  absence  of  any  routine  duties, 
Lowell  took  up  again  with  a  careless  prodigality 
the  occupation  of  letter  -  writing.  He  had  left 
friends  in  England  who  had  endeared  themselves' 
to  him,  and  whose  letters  to  him  readily  drew  a 
response,  and  to  his  old  friends  he  was  always 
faithful,  so  that,  taking  Mr.  Norton's  two  volumes 
as  a  gauge,  we  find  that  he  wrote  twice  as  many 
friendly  letters  in  the  five  years  after  his  return  to 
America  as  in  the  five  years  just  preceding. 

"I  am  already,"  he  writes  to  Mr.  Norton,  22 
July,  1885,  "  in  love  with  Southborough,  which  is 
a  charmingly  unadulterated  New  England  village, 
and  with  as  lovely  landscapes  as  I  ever  saw.  .  .  . 
'T  is  an  odd  shift  in  the  peep-hole  of  my  panorama 
from  London  to  this  Chartreuse.  For  the  present 
I  like  it  and  find  it  wholesome.  I  fancy  myself 
happy  sometimes  —  I  am  not  sure  —  but  then  I 
never  was  for  long ; "  and  to  Mrs.  Clifford  he 
wrote,  2  August :  "  I  am  planting  my  cabbages 
diligently  and  growing  as  much  like  them  as  I  can. 
One  must  have  confidants  of  one  kind  or  another, 
and  where  one  is  cut  off  from  women,  one  must 
follow  Wordsworth's  advice  and  seek  an  intimacy 
with  nature  in  whose  impartial  eyes  cabbages  are 
as  interesting  as  —  I  was  going  to  say  strawberry- 
leaves,  but  remembered  that  you  were  an  English 
woman.  I  was  rft  going  to  say  women,  though 


324  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

logically  I  ought.  Perhaps  they  are  as  safe.  I  am 
trying  to  make  myself  tolerable  to  five  grandchil 
dren,  though  I  am  not  so  sure  that  I  have  enough 
of  the  Grandfather  in  me  to  go  round  among  so 
many." 

There  is  a  playful  allusion  in  this  letter  to  a  side 
of  Lowell's  nature  which  is  hinted  at  also  in  his 
choice  of  correspondents.  He  was  peculiarly  de 
pendent  upon  the  companionship  of  women,  and  he 
attracted  to  himself  the  wittiest  and  most  respon 
sive.  For  it  was  not  so  much  the  cushioned  com 
fort  that  he  looked  for,  as  the  cosiness  of  good 
fellowship  and  the  intellectual  equality  which  he 
sometimes  found  and  always  prized.  He  loved  the 
generous  natures  with  whom  he  had  good  converse, 
and  his  talk  and  letters  went  freely  to  these  habit 
ual  dwellers  in  a  world  of  honest  sentiment.  As 
in  so  many  other  cases,  this  side  of  Lowell's  life 
found  its  expression  in  poetry,  and  there  is  no 
exaggeration  in  the  sonnet  "  Nightwatches,"  writ 
ten  after  the  death  of  one  who  had  stood  to  him  in 
this  free,  intimate  relation  for  many  years. 

In  August  he  went  to  Washington  to  close  his 
business  with  the  State  Department,  and  made 
with  great  pleasure  the  acquaintance  of  Mr.  Bay 
ard,  then  Secretary  of  State,  and  later  like  him  to 
represent  the  country  in  London.  He  met  Presi 
dent  Cleveland  also,  and  saw  in  him  "  a  legitimate 
birth  of  Democracy  and  not  a  byblow  like  Butler 
and  his  kind." 

Lowell  was  solicited  both  by  the  editor  of  the 
Atlantic  and  other  friends  to  take  up  again  his 


RETURN   TO   PRIVATE   LIFE  325 

contributions  to  literature,  but  he  put  them  off. 
He  had  no  inclination  to  write  —  he  was  glad  of 
the  solace  of  books  and  letters,  but  the  spur  to 
literary  activity  had  been  dulled.  Yet  he  kept  his 
Muse  at  least  as  a  sort  of  friendly  companion,  as 
when  on  the  seventy-fifth  birthday  of  his  neighbor 
and  associate  Dr.  Asa  Gray  he  wrote  :  - 

"  Just  Fate,  prolong-  his  life  well  spent, 
Whose  indefatigable  hours 
Have  been  as  gaily  innocent 
And  fragrant  as  his  flowers  !  " 

For  a  time  he  was  content  to  drift,  and  to  let  the 
indolence  which  he  had  overmastered  all  his  life 
get  the  upper  hand  of  him  now,  even  though  the 
pressure  of  circumstance  still  lay  heavy  on  him. 
"I  am  delighted,"  he  wrote  13  December,  1885,  to 
Mr.  John  W.  Field,  "  to  hear  that  you  are  getting 
on  so  well  —  better  than  I  feared  —  and  cannot 
enough  admire  your  pluck.  'T  is  all  the  more 
admirable  in  a  man  like  you  who  have  the  art  of 
finding  (or  making)  life  worth  living  so  much 
more  than  most  of  us.  As  for  me  I  am  a  little 
tired  now  and  then,  and  consent  to  grow  old  only 
because  I  can't  decently  help  it.  ...  As  for  my 
coming  on  to  Washington  —  I  don't  know  what  to 
say.  I  should  like  to  see  you  and  Eliza,  but  don't 
see  how  I  can  find  the  time  at  present.  I  have  a 
great  deal  to  do  if  I  could  only  do  it.  But  I  am 
beginning  to  feel  '  old  and  slow,'  as  Ulysses  said  to 
Dante.  Especially  do  I  feel  slow  as  compared 
with  what  I  once  was.  .  .  .  I  am  just  now  both 
ered  with  an  address  to  be  given  next  week  at  the 


326  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

opening  of  a  public  library  in  Chelsea.  When  I 
have  done  that  I  mean  to  hold  my  tongue  for  ever 
more.  Why  should  I  make  myself  wretched  when 
there  is  so  much  that  will  do  it  without  my  help  ?  " 

The  address  at  Chelsea  was  the  one  on  "  Books 
and  Libraries,"  included  in  his  "  Literary  and  Po 
litical  Addresses,"  an  address,  almost  conversa 
tional  in  its  manner,  marked  not  so  much  by 
felicity  of  expression  as  by  a  sanity  of  tone  and 
the  easy  deliverance  of  a  full  mind. 

A  public  function  quite  in  accord  with  his  aca 
demic  and  literary  tastes  was  the  presidency, 
which  he  accepted,  of  the  American  Archaeological 
Institute.  He  took  also  the  post  of  chairman  of 
a  committee  to  raise  funds  for  the  society's  school 
at  Athens.  "  I  find  myself  a  little  out  of  place," 
he  writes  to  Mr.  Reverdy  Johnson,  28  December, 
1885,  "  but  I  consented  to  serve  because  I  was  so 
thoroughly  persuaded  both  of  the  excellence  of 
the  object  proposed  and  of  the  honor  it  has  already 
done  and  is  likely  to  do  us  in  convincing  Europe 
that  we  are  not  wholly  given  over  as  a  nation  to 
the  pursuit  of  material  good.  The  English  school 
received  its  final  impulse  from  the  existence  and 
success  of  ours." 

At  the  end  of  January,  1886,  Lowell  went  to 
Washington,  at  the  urgent  request  of  the  Copy 
right  League,  to  advocate  the  cause  of  interna 
tional  copyright.  Two  separate  bills  designed  to 
bring  this  about  had  been  offered  in  the  Senate  by 
Senators  Hawley  and  Chace,  and  there  was  to  be  a 
hearing  on  them  before  the  Committee  on  Patents. 


RETURN  TO  PRIVATE  LIFE  327 

Several  publishers,  authors,  and  members  of  the 
League  had  argued  in  favor  of  some  action,  and 
one  gentleman,  the  late  Mr.  Gardiner  G.  Hubbard, 
had  appeared  in  opposition.  Mr.  Hubbard,  who 
was  well  known  as  the  most  active  promoter  of 
the  then  rather  new  Bell  telephone,  argued  that 
an  author's  righf  in  his  literary  property  differed 
from  that  in  any  other  kind  of  property ;  "  that 
while  he  has  the  manuscript  of  his  thoughts  in  his 
own  possession,  it  is  his  own,  and  that  when  he 
gives  it  out  to  the  world  it  ceases  to  be  his  own 
and  becomes  the  property  of  the  world."  1  He  laid 
great  stress,  further,  on  the  grounds  of  the  grant 
ing  of  copyright  by  Congress,  as  for  the  benefit  of 
the  public,  and  not  for  the  benefit  of  authors, 
and  finally  claimed  that  an  international  copyright 
would  be  injurious  to  the  public  by  tending  to 
raise  the  price  of  books. 

Lowell  came  in  while  Mr.  Hubbard  was  speak 
ing,  and  was  called  upon  by  the  chairman,  Senator 
Platt  of  Connecticut,  as  soon  as  Mr.  Hubbard  had 
sat  down.  He  had  not  intended  to  address  the 
committee  other  than  by  answering  such  questions 
as  might  be  put  to  him,  but  the  last  speaker's 
positions  nettled  him,  and  he  began  at  once  by 
attacking  them. 

"  There  are  one  or  two  things  in  the  very  ex 
traordinary  speech  which  Mr.  Hubbard  has  just 
addressed  to  you  which,  I  think,  call  for  some 
comment  on  my  part.  He  began  by  stating  what 
is  a  very  common  fallacy,  that  there  could  be  no 
1  Report  No.  1188,  49th  Congress,  1st  session,  p.  28. 


328  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

such  thing  as  property  in  books.  It  is  generally 
put  in  another  way,  that  there  can  be  no  such 
thing  as  property  in  an  idea.  There  is  a  feeling,  I 
know,  among  a  great  many  people  that  books,  even 
when  they  are  printed,  are  like  umbrellas,  force  na- 
turce  ;  but  by  Mr.  Hubbard  we  are  carried  farther 
back  than  that,  to  the  very  conception  of  the  book. 

"  Now,  nobody  supposes  that  there  can  be  pro 
perty  in  an  idea.  The  thing  is  a  fallacy  on  the 
face  of  it.  What  we  do  suppose  is  that  there  is  a 
property  in  the  fashioning  that  is  given  to  the 
idea,  the  work  that  a  man  has  put  into  it,  and  I 
think  the  Constitution  has  already  recognized  that 
in  granting  patents.  Patents  are  nothing  but  ideas 
fashioned  in  a  certain  way.  For  instance,  the  Bell 
telephone  is  precisely  a  parallel  case  to  that  of 
books,  and  I  think  there  are  a  great  many  people 
in  this  country  who  are  interested  in  the  Bell  tele 
phone  and  believe  it  to  be  property. 

"  It  appears  to  me  that  a  great  deal  of  what  is 
said  in  opposition  to  the  view  of  those  who  favor 
an  international  copyright  is,  like  the  statement  of 
Mr.  Hubbard,  purely  hypothetical.  He  tells  you 
that  it  would  make  books  dearer.  I  do  not  think 
he  has  the  slightest  evidence  011  which  to  show 
you  that  it  would  make  books  dearer.  My  own  de 
cided  opinion  is  that  it  would  make  books  cheaper. 
When  he  says,  also,  that  it  is  an  attempt  of  pub 
lishers  to  make  large  profits  on  small  editions, 
instead  of  small  profits  on  large  editions,  I  think  he 
should  have  a  more  general  knowledge  of  the  book 
trade  —  nay,  of  the  modern  tendencies  of  trade  in 


RETURN  TO  PRIVATE  LIFE  329 

general  —  before  he  makes  an  assertion  of  that 
sort.  It  is  based  on  the  practice  in  England  of 
publishing  one  expensive  edition,  and  even  in  Eng 
land  the  price  of  the  book  very  soon  falls.  But  the 
custom  there  has  been  pretty  much  dictated  to 
the  publishers  by  the  owners  of  circulating  libra 
ries  ;  and  already  there  is  a  revolt  against  it,  which 
is  becoming  intensified  on  the  whole,  and  I  believe 
a  reform  in  that  respect  will  take  place  there. 

"  I  have  one  practical  example  to  offer  on  the 
other  side.  For  instance,  Mr.  Douglas,  of  Edin 
burgh,  reprints  a  great  many  American  books  and 
pays  a  copyright  for  them.  He  prints  them  beau 
tifully  in  little  volumes  of  most  convenient  size, 
and  sells  them  for  a  shilling.  That  is  not  very 
dear.  He  pays  his  copyright,  remember.  I  my 
self  am  perfectly  satisfied  that  the  reading  public 
in  America,  being  much  larger  than  in  England, 
and  demanding  cheap  books,  the  result  of  a  copy 
right  law,  if  we  ever  get  one,  will  be  to  transfer  the 
great  bulk  ®f  the  book  trade  from  England  to  this 
country,  and  with  it  the  publishing  of  books.  That 
is  my  firm  belief.  But  that  is  purely  hypothetical, 
like  Mr.  Hubbard's  argument.  Yet  it  seems  to  me 
there  would  be  certain  reasons  for  thinking  so  in 
what  we  know  of  the  instincts  and  tendencies  of 
trade.  If  the  larger  market  be  here,  and  if  books 
have  to  be  printed  in  a  cheaper  form  in  order  to 
suit  that  market,  I  think  they  will  be  so  printed  ; 
and  so  far  as  the  American  public  is  concerned,  it 
appears  to  me  that  if  they  get  their  books  cheaply 
it  does  not  so  much  matter  where  they  are  printed. 


330  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

"  I,  myself,  take  the  moral  view  of  the  question. 
I  believe  that  this  is  a  simple  question  of  morality 
and  justice  ;  that  many  of  the  arguments  which 
Mr.  Hubbard  used  are  arguments  which  might  be 
used  for  picking  a  man's  pocket.  One  could  live,  a 
great  deal  cheaper,  undoubtedly,  if  he  could  sup 
ply  himself  from  other  people  without  any  labor 
or  cost.  But  at  the  same  time,  —  well,  it  was  not 
called  honest  when  I  was  young,  and  that  is  all  I 
can  say.  I  cannot  help  thinking  that  a  book  which 
was,  I  believe,  more  read  when  I  was  young  than 
it  is  now,  is  quite  right  when  it  says  that  '  right 
eousness  exalteth  a  nation.'  I  believe  this  is  a 
question  of  righteousness.  I  do  not  wish  to  urge 
that  too  far,  because  that  is  considered  a  little  too 
ideal,  I  believe.  But  that  is  my  view  of  it,  and  if 
I  were  asked  what  book  is  better  than  a  cheap  book, 
I  should  answer  that  there  is  one  book  better  than 
a  cheap  book,  and  that  is  a  book  honestly  come  by. 
That  would  be  my  feeling." 

A  series  of  questions  and  answers  followed  which 
travelled  over  a  good  deal  of  space,  from  the  habit 
of  book-buying  in  the  two  countries  to  the  rights 
and  wrongs  involved  in  copyright,  and  Lowell 
drew  upon  personal  experience  and  observation  in 
a  way  to  confirm  emphatically  the  title  which  he 
once  gave  himself,  "  I  am  a  bookman."  "  My  own 
impression  is,"  he  said  in  the  course  of  this  conver 
sation,  "  that  the  gathering  of  private  libraries  is 
diminishing ;  at  least  I  think  it  is  on  the  whole, 
according  to  my  own  observation.  I  mean  to  say 
that  fewer  persons,  in  proportion  to  the  number  of 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  331 

educated  people  in  a  community,  collect  libraries 
now  than  formerly,  because  large  libraries  are  now 
more  readily  within  the  reach  of  so  many  people. 
.  .  .  There  [in  England]  the  collection  of  libra 
ries  has  also  diminished  very  much,  but  is  still 
large  in  country  houses  and  so  on.  People  who 
are  rich  wish  to  have  a  handsome  copy  of  a  book 
in  their  library,  and  for  that  purpose  this  hand 
some  edition  is  published.  But  if  you  will  pardon 
me  for  digressing  for  a  moment  from  this  subject, 
it  seems  to  me  there  are  a  great  many  ways  in 
which  our  laws  about  books  are  very  disadvan 
tageous  to  the  country.  I  think,  myself,  that  the 
tax  on  books  is  a  barbarism."  Senator  Teller  here 
asked  him  if  he  meant  the  revenue  tax.  "  Yes  ;  it 
has  prevented  me  from  buying  a  great  many  books 
in  the  course  of  my  life  which  would  have  been 
very  valuable  to  me,  and  the  imprints  [reprints  ?]  l 
were  comparatively  valueless  when  I  got  them.  I 
cannot  at  this  moment  as  I  could  if  I  lived  in  any 
other  country  of  the  world,  even  Turkey,  subscribe 
to  a  foreign  society  and  receive  its  publications 
without  the  trouble  of  going  to  the  post-office  and 
paying  the  duty ;  and,  as  I  happen  to  live  up  in 
the  country  now,  that  is  very  inconvenient.  To  be 
sure,  as  they  know  me,  I  am  able  to  get  the  books 
sent  up  to  the  post-office  of  the  town  where  I  am 
living  and  pay  my  tax  there,  but  it  seems  to  me  a 
very  bad  system." 

The  chairman  asked  Lowell  if  people  who  read 

1  All  these  remarks  were  stenographically  reported  and  sub 
jected  probably  to  little  revision,  certainly  to  none  by  the  speaker. 


332  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  cheap  reprints  of  English  books  preserved 
them  to  any  extent ;  to  which  he  replied  :  "  No,  I 
think  they  are  not  preserved  at  all.  It  is  a  marvel 
where  they  go  to.  Those  books  get  out  of  print 
quickly.  I  remember  that  I  religiously  preserved 
all  the  books  that  were  sent  me  early  in  my  life  in 
order  to  give  them  to  the  college  library,  because  I 
said,  whether  worthless  or  not  they  will  disappear ; 
and  many  of  those  books  have  disappeared,  and 
cannot  be  bought  at  all,  or  procured,  except  the 
copies  preserved  there.  They  go  back  to  the  paper 
maker  as  waste  paper.  I  wish  to  say  before  I  sit 
down,  in  reference  to  the  gentleman  who  is  to  fol 
low  me,1  that  I  doubt  if  there  is  a  class  in  the  com 
munity  who  have  a  more  profound  sympathy  with 
the  typographical  unions  than  we  have.  It  is  not 
that  we  wish  to  deprive  them  of  their  bread.  I 
personally  have  a  very  strong  sympathy  with  all 
labor  organizations,  and  I  think,  as  I  have  said, 
the  result  of  a  copyright  law  will  be  to  give  them 
more  work  rather  than  less." 

Both  authors  and  those  publishers  who  sympa 
thized  with  the  movement  were  concentrating  their 
efforts  at  this  time  to  secure  the  passage  of  an 
act  which  should  effect  international  copyright. 
There  was  considerable  diversity  of  opinion,  espe 
cially  regarding  the  clause  which  required  all  for 
eign  books  to  be  set  up  and  printed  in  this  country, 
if  they  were  to  be  protected  by  copyright,  but  the 
largest  support  was  given  to  the  bill  introduced  by 
Senator  Chace  and  stands  now  as  law,  practically 

1  Mr.  James  Welsh,  representing-  the  Typographical  Union. 


RETURN   TO   PRIVATE   LIFE  333 

as  then  drawn.  The  editors  of  the  Century  col 
lected  vigorous  expressions  of  opinion  from  the 
most  representative  writers  and  published  the  tes 
timony  in  the  number  for  February,  1886.  In  re 
sponse  to  the  request  for  an  opinion,  Lowell  came 
into  the  editor's  office  one  day,  said  he  had  some 
thing  in  his  head,  and  wanted  a  pen  with  which  to 
write  it  out.  Then  he  sat  down  and  wrote  the 
famous  scorcher :  — 

"  In  vain  we  call  old  notions  fudge, 

And  bend  our  conscience  to  our  dealing ; 
The  Ten  Commandments  will  not  budge, 
And  stealing  will  continue  stealing." 

This  was  printed  in  facsimile  at  the  head  of  the 
testimony.  But  though  Lowell  was  an  uncompro 
mising  advocate  of  justice  in  this  matter,  perhaps 
because  he  was  so  uncompromising,  the  most  active 
advocates  of  the  bill  had  to  use  a  good  deal  of 
finesse  in  making  his  support  available.  The  act 
for  securing  international  copyright  was  not  a  par 
tisan  measure,  but  it  was  in  the  hands  of  the  Re 
publicans  in  Congress,  mainly,  and  Lowell  with  his 
emphatic  independence  in  politics  was  not  at  this 
time  a  persona  grata  with  Republican  politicians, 
who  were  incensed  by  the  falling  out  of  the  ranks 
of  men  of  character  and  influence.  The  act  was 
passed  finally  3  March,  1891. 

There  was  one  form  of  public  appearance  which 
Lowell  reluctantly  allowed  himself  to  take  up  in 
this  winter  of  1886.  The  rage  for  Authors'  Read 
ings  had  set  in,  and  under  the  guise  of  charity  of 
one  sort  or  another,  society  compelled  its  favorites 


334  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

to  stand  and  deliver  their  old  poems.  "I  am 
having  proof  sheets,"  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Field,  30 
March,  1886,  "  and  I  have  been  reading  in  public 
with  O.  W.  H.  and  oh,  don't  I  wish  I  had  never 
written  a  verse  !  Take  warning  by  me,  old  boy, 
and  if  you  make  a  rhyme  by  accident,  duck  your 
self  in  holy  water  to  wash  the  Devil  clean  out  of 
you,  —  or  they  '11  have  you  on  a  platform  before 
you  can  say  Jack  Robinson,  or  even  d — n."  A 
keener  thrust  came  to  him  now  and  then  when  he 
was  urged  to  read  poems  which  others  could  read, 
it  might  be,  with  equanimity,  but  which  were  for 
him  like  raising  the  lid  of  a  coffin. 

The  proof  sheets  to  which  he  refers  in  this  letter 
were  of  the  small  volume  "  Democracy  and  other 
Addresses,"  a  volume  which  appeared  in  the  spring 
of  1886,  just  before  Lowell  went  back  to  England 
for  the  summer.  Here  he  gave  himself  up  to 
those  pleasures  which  he  could  enjoy  but  sparingly 
when  he  was  in  the  official  harness.  His  friends 
welcomed  him  most  cordially,  and  he  made  a  round 
of  visits.  He  looked  on  upon  the  game  of  Eng 
lish  politics  with  the  eye  of  a  trained  observer,  but 
resisted  all  enticements  to  write  or  speak  for  the 
English  public,  though  he  did  preside  at  one  din 
ner.  "  I  made  an  epigram  (extempore)  one  day 
on  the  G.  O.  M.,"  he  writes  to  his  daughter,  "  and 
repeated  it  to  Lord  Acton. 

His  greatness  not  so  much  in  genius  lies 
As  in  adroitness,  when  occasions  rise, 
Lifelong1  convictions  to  extemporize. 

This  morning  I  find  the  last  lines  quoted  by  Aube- 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE   LIFE  335 

ron  Herbert  in  a  letter  to  the  Times,  but  luckily 
without  my  name.  It  is  a  warning." 

"  I  am  living  a  futile  life  here,"  he  writes  to  Mr. 
Norton,  "  but  am  as  fond  of  London  as  Charles 
Lamb.  The  rattle  of  a  hansom  shakes  new  life 
into  my  old  bones,  and  I  ruin  myself  in  them.  I 
love  such  evanescent  and  unimportance  glimpses 
of  the  world  as  I  catch  from  my  flying  perch.  I 
envy  the  birds  no  longer,  and  learn  better  to  con- 
verse  with  them.  Our  views  of  life  are  the  same." 
It  was  the  summer  also  when  Dr.  Holmes  made  hia 
royal  progress  through  England,  and  Lowell  had 
the  pleasure  of  seeing  the  hearty  welcome  his  old 
friend  received.  To  Mr.  Field  he  wrote,  27  July, 
1886:- 

"  I  met  Mrs.  Archibald  Forbes  the  other  day 
and  had  much  talk  with  her  about  you.  She  did 
not  give  me  much  comfort,  —  except  in  telling  me 
that  you  had  gone  away  from  Washington  for  the 
summer.  This  means,  I  suppose,  that  you  are  well 
enough  to  go  to  Ashfield,  which  I  take  as  a  good 
sign.  I  constantly  meet  old  friends  of  yours  here 
who  ask  after  you  affectionately.  I  give  them 
what  comfort  I  can  by  telling  them  how  bravely 
both  of  you  bear  up  under  your  common  sor 
row.  .  .  . 

"  Old  Mrs.  Proctor  told  me  a  good  story  lately 
which  may  amuse  you.  She  was  breakfasting  with 
Rogers.  Thackeray  and  Kinglake  were  there 
among  others.  So  was  Abraham  Hayward,  who 
began  abusing  Hough  ton  (then  Monkton  Milnes), 
a  great  favorite  of  hers.  Kinglake  tried  in  vain 


336  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

to  divert  or  stop  him.  At  last  Mrs.  P.  in  a  pause 
broke  out  with, '  Mr.  Hay  ward,  for  the  first  time  in 
my  life  I  wish  I  were  a  man  that  I  might  call  you 
out  and  make  you,  for  the  first  time  in  your  life,  a 
gentleman  ! '  She  is  as  young  as  ever  and  as  jeal 
ous  of  her  lovers,  tolerating  no  rivals. 

"  I  am  to  meet  Dona  Emilia  next  Friday  at 
dinner,  and  shall  take  upon  myself  to  give  her  your 
kindest  regards.  I  fear  she  is  not  very  well,  but 
she  is  so  fond  of  London  that  it  will  be  better  for 
her  than  a  course  of  the  waters  at  Wiesbaden.  I 
shall  be  very  glad  to  see  her  again.  I  last  met  her 
in  London  four  years  ago.  ...  By  the  way,  I  saw 
Don  Palo  (Francisco)  Giher  at  Oxford  whither  I 
went  to  help  Holmes  on  with  his  gown.  It  was  a 
pleasant  surprise  to  me  when  he  rushed  forward 
with  both  hands  outstretched  in  the  Master's  draw 
ing-room  at  Balliol  and  began  at  me  in  Spanish. 
As  the  window  was  behind  him  I  could  not  see  his 
face  and  did  not  at  once  recognize  him.  My  Span 
ish  naturally  creaked  a  little  on  its  hinges  after 
such  long  disuse,  but,  with  that  hidalquia  which  is 
common  to  all  his  race,  he  told  somebody  after 
wards  that  I  spoke  the  most  exquisite  Castilian  ! 
Even  at  twenty  I  should  n't  have  believed  —  and 
at  sixty-seven  ! 

"  I  have  been  whirling  round  like  a  marble  on 
the  van  of  a  windmill  and  am  worn  as  smooth.  I 
roll  off  on  the  slightest  incline.  But  I  can  lie  still 
on  the  lap  of  an  old  friendship  such  as  ours.  Good- 
by  and  God  bless  you." 

When  Lowell  went  abroad  in  the  spring  of  1886 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  337 

he  had  been  asked  to  give  the  address  in  Novem 
ber  at  the  250th  anniversary  of  the  founding  of 
Harvard  University.  The  thought  of  it  harassed 
him  during  the  summer.  "  I  am  distressed  with 
the  thought  of  that  abominable  address,"  he  wrote 
near  the  end  of  July.  "  I  have  not  yet  accepted 
and  would  decline  could  I  give  any  better  reason 
than  that  I  have  nothing  to  say.  Nobody  ever 
thinks  that  of  any  importance  !  What  have  I  done 
to  have  this  fly  thrust  into  my  pot  of  ointment 
which  grows  more  precious  every  day  by  diminu 
tion  like  the  Sibyl's  leaves?"  And  after  his 
return  to  Deerfoot  Farm  late  in  September,  when 
he  could  not  avoid  his  destiny,  he  wrote  :  "  I  am 
in  direful  dumps  about  my  address,  —  the  muse 
obstinately  dumb."  Once  more,  6  October,  he 
wrote :  "  I  have  been  mulling  over  my  address  and 
to-day  mean  to  break  into  it  in  earnest  by  blocking 
out  an  exordium.  It  does  n't  take  hold  of  me,  and 
I  always  feared  it  would  n't.  It  is  n't  exactly  in 
my  line.  To  fill  so  large  a  bowl  as  an  hour  I  shall 
have  to  draw  on  the  cow  with  the  iron  tail,  —  and 
pumping  is  an  exercise  that  always  wearies  me 
beyond  most." 

His  equanimity  was  further  shaken  by  a  dis 
agreeable  experience  when  the  son  of  an  old  friend, 
making  a  show  of  a  friendly  visit,  led  him  on  into 
discourse  about  England  and  English  affairs,  and 
then,  relying  on  his  memory,  decanted  the  conver 
sation  into  an  article  for  a  New  York  paper  with 
which  he  was  connected.  "If  he  had  reported 
what  I  really  said,  instead  of  his  version  of  it,  I 


338  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

should  not  feel  so  bitterly,"  was  Lowell's  comment, 

and  to  a  friend  he  wrote  :  "  As  for  he  knew 

that  I  did  n't  know  he  was  interviewing  me.  To 
any  sane  man  the  shimble-shamble  stuff  he  has 
made  me  utter  is  proof  of  it.  I  say  '  made  me 
utter '  deliberately,  because,  though  he  has  remem 
bered  some  of  the  subjects  (none  of  my  choosing) 
which  we  talked  about,  he  has  wholly  misrepre 
sented  the  tone  and  sometimes  falsified  the  sub 
stance  of  what  I  said.  .  .  .  The  worst  of  's 

infidelity  (I  mean  to  keep  my  temper)  is  that  it  is 
like  a  dead  rat  in  the  wall,  —  an  awful  stink  and 
no  cure." 

It  is  not  easy  to  say  just  what  gave  rise  to  the 
peculiarly  American  academic  custom  of  making  a 
celebration  to  consist  of  an  oration  and  a  poem,  but 
Harvard  was  fortunate  in  being  able  to  summon 
from  her  graduates  Holmes  to  deliver  a  poem  and 
Lowell  an  oration.  To  Lowell  himself  the  occa 
sion  was  stimulating,  not  only  because  of  the  pride 
and  loyalty  with  which  he  regarded  the  college, 
but  because  he  had  given  it  twenty  years  of  ser 
vice,  and  came  back  to  it  now  after  nearly  a  de 
cade  in  which  he  had  abundant  opportunity  for 
comparison  of  its  fruit  with  that  which  hung  on 
the  boughs  of  older  institutions.  As  one  reads 
again  an  address  which  was  listened  to  with  eager 
ness,  one  follows  the  course  which  Lowell's  thought 
took  with  a  deepening  sense  that  he  was  speaking 
out  of  a  full  mind,  not  so  much  upon  the  specific 
questions  of  university  education  as  upon  the  large 
aspects  of  education  and  life  which  rose  to  view  as 


RETURN   TO   PRIVATE   LIFE  339 

an  historical  survey  laid  them  bare.  The  address 
was  the  outcome  of  Lowell's  life  as  a  scholar 
broadening  into  the  experience  of  a  man  who  had 
had  to  do  with  the  affairs  of  a  great  world.  The 
affectionate  pride  which  he  had  in  New  England 
as  exemplified  in  his  historic  study,  "  New  Eng 
land  Two  Centuries  Ago,"  had  grown  into  a  feel 
ing  of  reverence  which  leads  him  in  the  opening 
passages  of  his  address  to  set  forth  the  founders 
of  the  college  in  a  manner  to  leave  on  the  minds 
of  his  hearers  the  impression  of  an  august  body 
chosen  out  of  the  greatest  of  their  time  to  lay  the 
foundation  of  a  noble  institution  ;  and  toward  the 
close  of  his  address  he  returns  to  this  theme  and 
presents  it  anew  with  an  eloquence  and  beauty  of 
phrase  that  make  the  passage  one  which  may  be 
read  without  fear  beside  the  sonorous  Latin  which 
faced  the  audience  in  Sanders  Theatre. 

"  They  who,  on  a  tiny  clearing  pared  from  the 
edge  of  the  woods,  built  here,  most  probably  with 
the  timber  hewed  from  the  trees  they  felled,  our 
earliest  hall,  with  the  solitude  of  ocean  behind 
them,  the  myster}r  of  forest  before  them,  and  all 
about  them  a  desolation,  most  surely  (si  quis  ani- 
mis  celestibus  locus)  share  our  gladness  and  our 
gratitude  at  the  splendid  fulfilment  of  their  vision. 
If  we  could  have  but  preserved  the  humble  roof 
which  housed  so  great  a  future,  Mr.  Ruskin  him 
self  would  almost  have  admitted  that  no  castle  or 
cathedral  was  ever  richer  in  sacred  associations,  in 
pathos  of  the  past,  and  in  moral  significance.  They 
who  reared  it  had  the  sublime  prescience  of  that 


340  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

courage  which  fears  only  God,  and  could  say  con 
fidently  in  the  face  of  all  discouragement  and 
doubt,  4  He  hath  led  me  forth  into  a  large  place  ; 
because  He  delighted  in  me,  He  hath  delivered 
me.'  We  cannot  honor  them  too  much ;  we  can 
repay  them  only  by  showing,  as  occasions  rise, 
that  we  do  not  undervalue  the  worth  of  their  ex 
ample." 

It  was  out  of  this  natural  consideration  of  the 
origin  of  the  University  that  Lowell  passed  by  an 
historical  process  to  an  analysis  of  the  objects  had 
in  founding  it  and  the  spirit  in  which  these  objects 
had  been  pursued.  He  troubled  himself  not  at  all 
with  the  external  affairs  of  the  college  and  used  no 
time  in  tracing  its  material  development.  He  had 
found  its  chief  office  to  be  that  of  maintaining  and 
handing  down  the  traditions  "'of  how  excellent  a 
thing  Learning  was,"  and  his  main  contention  was 
that  the  chief  office  of  the  University  still  is 
to  train  in  learning  rather  than  in  knowledge.  It 
was  in  urging  this  that  he  made  a  plea  for  the 
broad  and  not  the  special  interpretation  of  the 
term  Learning.  As  the  result  of  his  own  study 
and  observation  he  contended  earnestly  for  the 
Humanities  as  the  paramount  interest. 

Lowell  admitted  in  a  letter  he  wrote  to  Gr.  H. 
Palmer,  one  of  the  most  intelligent  advocates  of 
those  new  methods  in  education  which  found  their 
fullest  expression  in  what  is  known  as  the  "  elec 
tive  system,"  that  he  based  some  parts  of  his 
address  rather  on  his  experience  as  a  teacher 
there  than  on  the  later  conditions  of  teaching  in 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE   LIFE  341 

the  college ;  but  after  all  his  dispute  was  with  the 
elective  system,  for  he  distrusted  what  looked  to 
him  like  a  departure  from  the  "  unbroken  experi 
ence  and  practice  of  mankind."  One  does  not  need 
to  doubt  or  believe  in  this  particular  collegiate 
method  to  give  full  assent  to  Lowell's  dictum  that 
"  the  most  precious  property  of  culture  and  of  a 
college  as  its  trustee  is  to  maintain  higher  ideals 
of  life  and  its  purpose,  to  keep  trimmed  and  burn 
ing  the  lamps  of  that  pharos,  built  by  wiser  than 
we,  that  warns  from  the  reef  and  shallows  of  popu 
lar  doctrine."  For  as  he  moves  forward  in  his 
address,  he  is  drawn  inevitably  into  a  considera 
tion  of  what  was,  first  and  last,  the  fundamental 
social  question  with  him,  the  democratic  idea.  He 
had  refrained,  as  we  have  seen,  from  touching  in 
his  English  address  on  Democracy  upon  the  perils 
which  beset  it  in  its  American  stronghold,  but  here, 
at  home,  in  the  very  heart  of  its  stoutest  defence, 
he  must  needs  use  these  perils  to  emphasize  his 
doctrine  that  the  prime  business  of  the  college  is 
to  "  set  free,  to  supple,  and  to  train  the  faculties  in 
such  wise  as  shall  make  them  most  effective  for 
whatever  task  life  may  afterwards  set  them,  for 
the  duties  of  life  rather  than  for  its  business,  and 
to  open  windows  on  every  side  of  the  mind  where 
thickness  of  wall  does  not  prevent  it." 

The  whole  address  is  an  exemplification  of  how 
surely  Lowell's  mind  had  come  to  base  all  specula 
tions  on  the  broad  bottom  of  a  political  organism. 
And  as  he  was  still  unequivocally  an  idealist,  the 
very  melancholy  of  his  foreboding,  cropping  out  in 


342  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

this  and  other  addresses,  bore  testimony  not  to  his 
faintheartedness  but  to  his  apprehension  of  the 
distance  which  prevailed  between  his  ideal  and 
the  fact.  He  saw  in  the  whole  the  sum  of  the  par 
ticulars,  and,  as  individual  character  working  in 
freedom  was  the  ultimate  end  in  persons,  he  would 
listen  to  nothing  else  when  he  applied  his  ear  to 
the  movement  of  the  people ;  and  thus  it  was  that 
he  distrusted  any  departure  of  the  University  in 
its  methods  from  that  line  which  had  resulted  in 
the  historic  democracy  that  he  believed  to  have 
found  its  true  exemplar  in  New  England. 

When  Lowell  was  in  England  in  the  summer  of 
1886  he  had  written  to  Mr.  Gilder  that  his  friend 
Miss  Mary  Boyle  had  some  letters  of  Landor  which 
she  had  intrusted  to  him  for  publication,  and  he 
proposed  to  preface  them  with  an  introduction  of 
his  own  if  Mr.  Gilder  would  publish  the  paper  in 
the  Century.  His  letters  show  that  he  was  moved 
not  by  any  desire  to  write  on  Landor,  but  to  help 
an  old  friend,  and  now  that  his  Harvard  address 
was  off  his  hands,  he  applied  himself  to  the  task. 
He  had  the  curiosity  to  look  up  his  early  paper  on 
Landor  in  the  Massachusetts  Quarterly?-  in  which 
he  remarks  he  found  one  good  sentence  and  one 
other  that  he  could  not  understand.2  He  sent  the 
paper  to  Mr.  Gilder,  23  December,  1886  :  "  I  send 
you  a  Christmas  gift.  I  have  made  more  of  it 

1  See  supra,  vol.  i.  p.  293. 

2  "  I  went  also,"  he  says,  after  hunting  up  the  magazine  in  the 
Athenseum,  "  to  see  Whittier,  who  was  in  town.     He  was  very 
cordial.     There  is  a  wrinkled  freshness  about  him  as  of  a  russet 
apple  in  April,  but  I  fear  we  shan't  have  him  much  longer." 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  343 

than  I  expected,  but  you  may  eat  only  the  plums 
if  you  like  and  give  to  the  poor  the  pudding  in 
which  I  have  hidden  them.  The  letters,  thank 
Heaven,  are  better  than  I  thought.  The  last  (on 
Powers's  death)  is  charming.  I  have  arranged 
them  as  well  as  I  could  without  books.  There  is 
one  on  the  Chinese  War  which  I  could  date  could 
I  remember  the  year  of  that  outrage  —  1841  or  2  ? 
You  might  find  out. 

"  Have  I  added  too  much  of  my  own  ?  And  is 
it  dull  ?  /  am,  but  that 's  nothing  to  the  purpose. 
I  could  easily  have  held  my  peace,  but  I  promised 
to  play  the  Master  of  Ceremonies  and  must  pro 
claim  the  rank  of  my  guests. 

"  I  am  sorry  that  some  of  the  letters  are  copied 
on  both  sides.  Most  of  them  are  in  proper  form. 
Send  me  proof  here  unless  I  say  otherwise. 

If  the  hunting-  up  of  Christmas  gifts  has  n't  killed  her, 
Give  my  love  to  Mrs.  Gilder."  l 

1  A  month  before  Mr.  Gilder  had  asked  for  a  poem,  and  Lowell 
had  put  him  off  thus  :  "  Rhymes  for  Gilder  indeed  !  He  does  n't 
need  'em  for  he  can  make  'em.  But  I  have  a  pocketful.  I  give 
you  one  at  a  time  :  — 

"  Love  to  Mrs.  Gilder 
And  to  all  the  childer." 

After  that,  in  a  series  of  brief  notes  called  out  by  the  Landor  arti 
cle,  there  was  a  peppering-  of  these  lines,  each  note  ending  in  a 
couplet,  as  — 

"  Give  my  love  to  Mrs.  Gilder, 
Hope  this  weather  hasn't  chiird  her." 

"Love  to  Mrs.  Gilder, 
Glad  that  it  thrilled  her." 

"  Love  to  Mrs.  Gilder : 
At  her  birth  kind  fairies  filled  her 
(to  be  continued  in  my  next)." 


344  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

The  paper,  which  is  included  in  "  Latest  Liter 
ary  Essays  and  Addresses,"  was  a  most  agreeable 
compound  of  criticism  and  personal  reminiscence, 
and  contains  what  Lowell  rarely  ventured  on  in  his 
printed  work,  but  now  and  then  in  his  letters  with 
real  success  —  the  portraiture  of  a  man. 

The  article  did  not  appear  for  a  year ;  mean 
while  he  was  in  correspondence  with  Mr.  Aldrich 
respecting  some  poems,  and  he  had  engaged  to 
write  the  introduction  to  a  subscription  book,  "The 
1  World's  Progress."  He  had  the  assurance  that  the 
work  thus  introduced  was  a  serious  one,  but  his 
introduction  had  no  special  relation  to  it ;  it  was 
an  independent  paper.  "  It  rather  attracts  me,"  he 
wrote,  "  through  my  sense  of  humor.  It  will  be 
pure  creation  made  out  of  nothing,  not  even  nebula 
or  star-dust,"  and  he  added,  what  was  indeed  the 
secret  of  his  undertaking  the  work,  "  the  money  it 
will  fetch  me  will  be  a  great  medicine.  Grand 
fathers  get  miserly.  I  never  saved  a  penny  till  I 
had  two  [grandchildren] ."  As  the  new  year  opened, 
and  he  found  himself  in  the  midst  of  this  set  task : 
44 1  don't  get  on  with  the  world  at  all  since  I  half 
promised  to  write  an  introduction  to  4  The  World's 
Progress,'  a  megatherium  of  a  book  in  two  volumes, 
quarto.  I  hear  their  heavy  footfall  behind  me  wher 
ever  I  go,  and  am  sure  they  will  trample  me  into 
the  mud  at  last." 

"  (Continued) 

Cup  with  all  sweet  gifts  and  trilled  her 

(to  be  continued)  " 

but  in  his  next  he  is  obliged  to  write  :  "  I  have  lost  my  cue  in  the 
epic  poem  to  Mrs.  Gilder's  address.  I  thought  I  could  carry  it  in 
my  memory,  but  find  that  her  pocket  has  holes  in  it." 


KETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  345 

The  Introduction,  though  undertaken  apparently 
with  a  reluctant  rather  than  an  eager  mind,  and 
bearing  indeed  some  marks  of  a  perfunctory  per 
formance,  is  yet  not  only  interesting  in  itself  but 
valuable  as  a  mirror  in  which  to  catch  a  passing  re 
flection  of  its  author's  mind.  Aware  that  the  book 
to  follow  would  deal  largely  with  those  advances 
in  civilization  which  publishers  and  writers  in  their 
bookkeeping  like  to  record  to  the  credit  of  the 
world,  he  cannot  forbear  at  the  outset  gently  re 
minding  his  readers  that  with  all  our  statistics  we 
cannot  "  make  ourselves  independent  of  the  inex 
tinguishable  lamps  of  heaven,"  and  with  a  sort  of 
under-the-breath  doubt  if  he  may  not  be  letting  his 
own  temperament  get  in  the  way  of  more  exact 
standards  of  measurement,  he  allows  himself  for  a 
moment  to  pause  over  the  changes  in  civilization, 
which  accepted  as  progress  do  yet  obliterate  some 
very  wonderful  prints  which  the  foot  of  man  has 
made.  It  is  the  old  song  of  laudator  temporis 
acti,  sung  to  the  air  of  his  own  brooding  age. 

But  having  thus,  as  it  were,  satisfied  his  con 
science  by  discharging  the  debt  he  owed  to  his  own 
personal  taste  in  the  matter  of  what  constitutes 
progress,  he  takes  up  the  real  business  of  the  In 
troduction  and  quickly  becomes  forgetful  of  him 
self  the  philosopher  in  the  pleasure  which  the  poet 
and  artist  in  him  may  take  with  a  very  large  and 
plastic  substance.  Near  the  close  of  the  paper  he 
writes :  "  Should  the  doctrines  of  Natural  Selec 
tion,  Survival  of  the  Fittest,  and  Heredity,  be 
accepted  as  Laws  of  Nature,  they  must  profoundly 


346  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

modify  the  thought  of  men  and,  consequently,  their 
action."  He  himself,  with  his  aversion  to  the  specu 
lations  of  science,  had  but  a  bowing  acquaintance 
with  those  investigations  of  Darwin  and  Huxley  and 
their  fellows  which  brought  about  so  great  a  revo 
lution  of  thought  in  his  lifetime,  and  clearly  was 
impatient  of  what  he  regarded  as  the  encroach 
ment  of  science  upon  the  humanities  in  the  forma 
tion  of  intellectual  beliefs ;  but  he  was,  after  all,  a 
child  of  his  time,  and  his  thought  had  been,  whether 
he  would  or  no,  modified  by  the  results  of  scientific 
investigation.  At  any  rate,  he  had  the  poet's  fac 
ulty  for  appropriating  results,  and  the  picture 
which  he  draws  in  this  Introduction  of  the  evolu 
tion  of  the  earth  and  of  man's  early  mastery  of  it 
is  a  striking  piece  of  imaginative  writing,  touched 
here  and  there  with  a  dash  of  wit  which  one  almost 
fancies  was  Lowell's  intellectual  aside  to  the  Ba 
laam-like  prophecy  he  was  compelled  to  deliver. 

It  is,  however,  when  he  emerges  in  his  thought 
upon  those  great  plains  of  society  where  his  mind 
was  most  wont  to  dwell,  that  Lowell  falls  into  an 
earnestness  of  tone  which  quite  as  surely  indicates 
that  he  had  been  warmed  by  the  fire  he  had  kin 
dled  into  a  healthy  and  natural  vigor,  and  when, 
from  a  rapid  survey  of  the  world's  past  growing 
more  and  more  present  under  his  touch,  he  comes 
to  forecast  the  world's  future,  it  is  with  a  voice 
familiar  through  his  recent  addresses  and  poems 
and  letters  that  we  hear  him  speak.  Again  he 
recurs  to  that  significant  element  in  modern  life 
about  which  his  mind  was  constantly  revolving, 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  347 

the  political  organization  of  men  in  its  relation 
to  their  individual  character,  and  his  definitions 
of  Democracy  are  here  more  precise,  more  care 
fully  formulated  than  in  any  of  his  writings.  The 
main  passage  is  so  notable  that  it  deserves  to  be 
read  again,  apart  from  its  context,  as  the  last  state 
ment  made  by  one  whose  whole  life  was,  in  a  mea 
sure,  occupied  with  an  exposition  of  the  truths 
here  laid  down. 

"In  casting  the  figure  of  the  World's  future, 
many  new  elements,  many  disturbing  forces,  must 
be  taken  into  account.  First  of  all  is  Democracy, 
which,  within  the  memory  of  men  yet  living,  has 
assumed  almost  the  privilege  of  a  Law  of  Nature, 
and  seems  to  be  making  constant  advances  towards 
universal  dominion.  Its  ideal  is  to  substitute  the 
interest  of  the  many  for  that  of  the  few  as  the  test 
of  what  is  wise  in  polity  and  administration,  and 
the  opinion  of  the  many  for  that  of  the  few  as  the 
rule  of  conduct  in  public  affairs.  That  the  interest 
of  the  many  is  the  object  of  whatever  social  organi 
zation  man  has  hitherto  been  able  to  effect  seems 
unquestionable  ;  whether  their  opinions  are  so  safe 
a  guide  as  the  opinions  of  the  few,  and  whether  it 
will  ever  be  possible,  or  wise  if  possible,  to  substi 
tute  the  one  for  the  other  in  the  hegemony  of 
the  World,  is  a  question  still  open  for  debate. 
Whether  there  was  ever  such  a  thing  as  a  Social 
Contract  or  not,  as  has  been  somewhat  otiosely  dis 
cussed,  this,  at  least,  is  certain,  —  that  the  basis 
of  all  Society  is  the  putting  of  the  force  of  all  at 
the  disposal  of  all,  by  means  of  some  arrangement 


348  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

assented  to  by  all,  for  the  protection  of  all,  and 
this  under  certain  prescribed  forms.  This  has  al 
ways  been,  consciously  or  unconsciously,  the  object 
for  which  men  have  striven,  and  which  they  have 
more  or  less  clumsily  accomplished.  The  State  — 
some  established  Order  of  Things,  under  whatever 
name  —  has  always  been,  and  must  always  be,  the 
supremely  important  thing ;  because  in  it  the  in 
terests  of  all  are  invested,  by  it  the  duties  of  all 
imposed  and  exacted.  In  point  of  fact,  though  it 
be  often  strangely  overlooked,  the  claim  to  any 
selfish  hereditary  privilege  because  you  are  born  a 
man  is  as  absurd  as  the  same  claim  because  you 
are  born  a  noble.  In  a  last  analysis,  there  is  but 
one  natural  right ;  and  that  is  the  right  of  superior 
force.  This  primary  right  having  been  found  un 
workable  in  practice,  has  been  deposited,  for  the 
convenience  of  all,  with  the  State,  from  which,  as 
the  maker,  guardian,  and  executor  of  Law,  and 
as  a  common  fund  for  the  use  of  all,  the  rights  of 
each  are  derived,  and  man  thus  made  as  free  as  he 
can  be  without  harm  to  his  neighbor.  It  was  this 
surrender  of  private  jurisdiction  which  made  civili 
zation  possible,  and  keeps  it  so.  The  abrogation 
of  the  right  of  private  war  has  done  more  to  secure 
the  rights  of  man,  properly  understood,  —  and, 
consequently,  for  his  well-being,  —  than  all  the 
theories  spun  from  the  brain  of  the  most  subtle 
speculator,  who,  finding  himself  cramped  by  the 
actual  conditions  of  life,  fancies  it  as  easy  to  make 
a  better  world  than  God  intended,  as  it  has  been 
proved  difficult  to  keep  in  running  order  the  world 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  349 

that  man  has  made  out  of  his  fragmentary  con 
ception  of  the  divine  thought.  The  great  peril  of 
democracy  is  that  the  assertion  of  private  right 
should  be  pushed  to  the  obscuring  of  the  superior 
obligation  of  public  duty." 

Having  thus  discoursed  upon  what  is  most  fun 
damental  in  political  thinking,  he  passes,  after  a 
brief  reflection  upon  the  growing  function  of  the 
press,  to  enquire  into  that  new  factor  in  the  pro 
blem  of  the  future  which  takes  the  name  of  Social 
ism.  He  distinguishes  here,  as  elsewhere,  between 
socialism  as  a  new  reading  of  the  law  of  rights  and 
duties,  and  State  Socialism.  He  repeats  his  warn 
ing  against  this  form  which  he  holds  destructive  of 
a  genuine  democracy,  for  he  distrusts  the  robbery 
of  man's  freedom  of  development  in  character  for 
the  sake  of  paying  him  back  in  the  paper  promises 
of  security  from  misfortune.  The  whole  latter 
part  of  this  Introduction,  in  spite  of  its  hurried 
manner,  is  a  footnote  to  the  history  of  Lowell's 
thought  on  some  of  the  greatest  of  themes. 

The  intimation  given  above,  that  Lowell  could 
not  quite  afford  the  luxury  of  being  a  bystander 
in  his  old  age,  reminds  us  how  close  he  sailed  to 
the  wind  throughout  his  life,  yet  how  faithfully  he 
kept  off  the  reefs  of  debt.  At  times  he  had  enough 
to  live  on  comfortably  ;  when  he  could  not  live 
what  is  called  comfortably,  he  simply  drew  in,  and 
at  least  knew  not  the  discomfort  of  living  beyond 
his  means.  He  had  not  now  the  resources  of  his 
professorship,  and  he  was  fain  to  increase  the  in 
come  which  his  small  estate  and  his  copyrights 


350  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

brought  him  by  such  tasks  as  the  Introduction  we 
have  considered,  and  other  more  congenial  liter 
ary  labors.  His  reputation,  fortunately,  had  now 
turned  capital  so  far  as  the  quick  assets  of  his 
writing  went.  He  could  command  good  prices 
from  editors,  but  by  a  not  uncommon  fortune 
periodical  work  yielded  him  much  better  return 
than  his  accumulating  books.  In  a  letter  written 
to  Thomas  Hughes,  10  January,  1887,  he  makes 
this  frank  statement  of  his  affairs  :  "  Rejoice  with 
me  that  I  am  getting  popular  in  my  old  age,  and 
hope  to  pay  my  this  year's  trip  to  the  dear  old 
Home  without  defrauding  my  grandchildren.1  I 
get  twenty-five  cents,  I  think  it  is,  on  copies  [of 
"  Democracy  "]  sold  during  the  first  eight  months 
after  publication,  and  then  it  goes  into  my  general 
copyright,  for  which  I  am  paid  £400  a  year.  Not 
much  after  nearly  fifty  years  of  authorship,  but 
enough  to  keep  me  from  the  almshouse." 

His  friends  sometimes  chided  him  for  not  reck 
oning  in  his  price  the  worth  of  his  name,  but  he 
had  it  not  in  him  to  drive  sharp  bargains.  Still, 
now  and  then  he  braced  himself,  as  when  he  wrote 
fco  a  friendly  editor  respecting  a  poem  he  had 
sent  him :  "  Another  magazine  would  have  given 

me .     I  am  not  speaking  of  intrinsic  but  of 

commercial  values,  of  course.  I  think  one  ought 
to  make  hay  while  the  sun  shines,  and  mine,  after 
a  good  deal  of  cloudy  weather,  seems  to  be  shining 
now.  As  I  don't  know  how  long  this  meteoric 
phenomenon  is  to  last,  I  must  be  diligent  with  my 
1  That  is,  by  parting  with  more  of  his  land  in  Cambridge. 


RETURN  TO  PRIVATE  LIFE  351 

windrows  and  cocks  that  my  crop  may  be  in  the 
mow  before  a  change  of  weather.  As  an  author, 
you  will  sympathize  with  me,  while  as  editor,  you 
will  ask  me  blandly  how  flint-skins  are  quoted  in 
the  last  prices  current.  I  fancy  you  with  that  dual 
expression  of  countenance  typified  by  Hamlet  as 
4  one  dropping  and  one  auspicious  eye  '  —  only  I  see 
that  I  have  got  the  epithets  in  the  wrong  order  for 
the  metre." 

In  the  letter  to  Mr.  Hughes  last  quoted,  Lowell 
says  :  "  I  am  going  to  talk  on  politics  to  the  people 
of  Chicago  on  my  next  birthday,"  and  he  went 
to  Chicago  to  fulfil  this  engagement.  The  Union 
League  Club  of  that  city  had  proposed  to  cele 
brate  Washington's  birthday  by  public  exercises 
in  Music  Hall,  consisting  mainly  of  Lowell's  ad 
dress,  which  was  announced  to  be  on  "  American 
Politics."  The  house  was  completely  filled  and 
Lowell  was  given  a  hearty  welcome.  The  au 
dience,  however,  was  greatly  taken  aback  at  the 
first  words  of  the  speaker,  for  he  said  when  he 
came  forward  that  he  had  changed  his  subject  and 
would  speak  not  on  "  American  Politics,"  but  upon 
the  principles  of  literary  criticism  as  illustrated 
by  Shakespeare's  Richard  III.,  a  paper  which  he 
had  read  in  1883  before  the  Edinburgh  Philosophi 
cal  Institution,  and  which  was  included,  after  his 
death,  in  "  Latest  Literary  Essays  and  Addresses." 
He  went  on  to  say  that  in  announcing  politics  as 
the  subject  of  his  address  he  had  not  fully  realized 
the  conditions  under  which  it  was  to  be  delivered ; 
that  he  was  accustomed  to  speak  frankly,  but  that 


352  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

he  found  himself  the  guest  and,  in  a  manner,  the 
representative  of  the  Club.  What  he  had  to  say 
would  plainly  give  offence  to  his  hosts,  and  he  was 
thus  compelled  on  the  score  of  courtesy  to  change 
his  subject. 

The  situation  was  one  which  might  have  led 
those  present  to  detect  some  irony  in  Lowell's  po 
liteness.  The  Union  League  Club  was  a  Republi 
can  organization  under  the  control  of  the  Elaine 
wing  of  the  party.  It  had  succeeded  in  getting 
rid  of  those  Republicans  who  had  been  hostile  to 
Elaine,  amongst  whom  was  the  gentleman  who  was 
Lowell's  host.  But  Lowell  had  made  no  conceal 
ment  of  the  position  he  occupied.  He  made  it 
clear  enough  at  this  time,  a  couple  of  days  later 
when  he  was  a  guest  of  the  Harvard  Club  of  Chi 
cago:  "I  stood  outside  of  party,"  he  then  said, 
"  for  nearly  twenty-five  years,  and  I  was  perfectly 
happy,  I  assure  you.  .  .  .  Party  organization,  no 
doubt,  is  a  very  convenient  thing,  but  a  great  many 
people,  and  I  feel  very  strongly  with  them,  feel 
that  when  loyalty  to  party  means  worse  disloyalty 
to  conscience,  it  is  then  asking  more  than  any  good 
man  or  any  good  citizen  ought  to  concede." 

Upon  his  return  from  Chicago  Lowell  gave  six 
lectures  on  the  Old  Dramatists  before  the  Low 
ell  Institute.  Though  in  accepting  the  invitation 
he  was  returning  to  an  early  love  he  had  never 
forsaken,  the  preparation  was  a  burden.  "  I 
I  have  n't  time  for  a  word  more,"  he  wrote  to  Mr. 
Gilder,  3  March,  1887,  "  for  I  begin  a  course  of 
lectures  next  Tuesday  and  have  n't  yet  begun  to 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  353 

write  them,  though  I  have  done  a  deil  o'  thinking," 
and  to  Mr.  Higginson  on  8  March :  "  I  am  fagged 
to  death.  I  never  ought  to  have  consented  to  the 
Lowell  Lectures.  If  I  get  over  them  without 
breaking  down,  I  shall  be  happy.  After  they  are 
(if  /  am  not)  over,  I  will  try  to  do  what  you  ask. 
But  my  brains  are  husks  just  now."  Perhaps  there 
was  no  better  barometer  of  Lowell's  spirits  than 
his  temper  regarding  out  of  door  life.  Time  was 
when  the  frosty  winter  air  was  elixir  to  him,  but 
now  he  writes :  "It  is  growing  colder  as  my  legs 
inform  me  —  for  I  have  had  no  fire  to-day.  I  look 
out  of  window  and  see  that  the  sun  is  gone  behind 
a  cloud,  and  the  white  lines  of  snow  along  the 
walls  marking  out  the  landscape  as  if  for  a  tennis- 
court  of  Anakim.  I  don't  like  winter  so  well  as  I 
used.  It  tempts  the  rheumatism  out  of  all  its 
ambushes,  as  the  sun  thaws  out  snakes.  And  the 
walking  is  like  bad  verses."  Th§  confession  gains 
force  when  one  considers  that  all  his  life  Lowell 
had  been  indifferent  to  the  need  of  a  top  coat,  and 
preferred  to  work  in  Lis  study  at  a  temperature 
of  60°. 

In  his  first  lecture  Lowell  said  that  he  should 
have  preferred  to  entitle  his  course  "  Readings . 
from  the  Old  English  Dramatists  with  illustrative 
comments,"  and  that  is  practically  what  he  made 
of  his  work.  The  slim  volume  in  which,  after  his 
death,  the  six  lectures  were  contained,  does  not  at 
all  stand  for  six  hours'  entertainment  of  his  audi 
ence  ;  long  passages  which  he  read  from  printed 
books  do  not  appear  at  all,  as  there  were  no  pas- 


354  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

sages  in  his  written  lectures  which  introduced  or 
followed  them.  Lowell  was  recurring  to  a  familiar 
theme,  and  his  intention  plainly  was  to  speak 
freely  out  of  a  full  mind.  He  does  not  appear 
to  have  re-read  his  early  "  Conversations ;  "  he  had 
not  seen  it,  he  said,  for  many  years,  and  he  was 
not  quite  sure  just  what  its  subjects  were.  A  com- 
»  parison  of  the  two  treatments  separated  by  forty- 
V  four  years  shows  curious  likenesses  and  differences. 
^As  will  be  remembered,  the  young  critic  was  so 
zealous  over  his  ideas  of  reform  that  Chapman  and 
Ford,  the  only  dramatists  he  treated,  and  Chaucer, 
were  often  no  more  than  mere  prompters  in  the  dis 
cussion  of  some  current  phase  of  morals  or  society. 
A  little  of  this  disposition  to  vagrancy  reappears 
in  these  later  talks,  for  they  are  quite  as  informal 
in  their  way  as  were  the  earlier  Conversations. 
But  in  place  of  the  topics  connected  with  reform, 
there  are  more  cognate  themes.  Since  he  is  to 
speak  of  Marlowe,  he  finds  it  easy  to  make,  by 
way  of  preface,  an  enquiry  into  the  refinement 
which  had  been  going  on  in  the  language,  and  so, 
by  natural  association,  to  one  of  his  old  themes, 
the  sanctity  of  the  English  tongue.  In  intro 
ducing  Webster  also,  he  has  some  quiet  criticism 
on  the  function  of  Form ;  and  when  he  passes  to 
Chapman,  an  enquiry  into  the  personal  element  in 
literature  leads  him  into  some  remarks  on  biogra 
phies,  autobiographies,  and  the  modern  zest  for 
intimacies  in  the  lives  of  men,  remarks  which  gain 
some  earnestness,  no  doubt,  from  experiences  which 
he  had  undergone. 


RETURN  TO    PRIVATE  LIFE  355 

But  for  the  most  part,  he  keeps  closely  to  his 
business  of  inviting  his  hearers  to  share  with  him 
the  enjoyment  of  the  dramatists  whom  he  reads 
and  comments  on,  and  when  we  compare  the  actual 
appreciation  and  criticism  in  the  two  books,  the 
difference  is  mainly  in  the  mellowness  and  quiet 
assurance  which  pervade  the  later  treatment,  anc| 
in  the  fact  that  in  the  earlier  book  he  was  more 
concerned  with  what  in  old-fashioned  terms  were 
the  "  beauties  "  of  the  poets,  in  the  later,  withtthe 
art  and  the  constructive  faculty. 

In  his  half-homeless  condition,  Lowell  looked 
with  eagerness  to  his  summers  in  England.  There 
he  had  in  its  leisurely  form  the  social  life  which 
had  come  to  be  a  real  solace  to  him,  and  there  too 
he  found  the  world  arranged  for  the  ease  and  com 
fort  of  a  solitary.  He  sailed  for  England  this 
year  on  the  21st  of  April,  and  found  himself 
shortly  in  his  familiar  lodgings  in  London.  He 
liked  the  sense  of  world  activity  which  he  felt  in 
the  heart  of  that  great  city.  "  Nothing  can  be 
more  bewildering,"  he  wrote  to  his  daughter,  "  than 
the  sudden  change  in  my  habits  and  surroundings. 
Were  it  merely  from  the  dumbness  of  South- 
borough  to  the  clatter  and  chatter  of  London,  it 
would  be  queer  enough ;  from  the  rising  and  fall 
ing  murmur  of  the  mill  to  this  roar  of  the  human 
torrent.  But  I  can  hardly  help  laughing  some 
times  when  I  think  how  a  single  step  from  my 
hermitage  takes  me  into  Babylon.  Meanwhile*  it 
amuses  and  interests  me.  My  own  vitality  seems 
to  reenforce  itself  as  if  by  some  unconscious  trans- 


356  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

fusion   of    the   blood   from   these   ever-throbbing 
arteries  of  life  into  my  own."  1 

There  were  two  places  in  England,  outside  of 
London,  in  which  he  especially  delighted :  one  was 
St.  Ives  in  Cornwall,  the  resort  of  his  friends  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Leslie  Stephen,  the  other  was  Whitby  in 
Yorkshire.  For  six  years,  with  the  exception  of 
1885,  he  had  made  a  summer  stay  in  Whitby.  It 
was  then  a  quiet,  primitive  place ;  now  it  knows 
the  flood  of  summer  excursionists.  Lowell  liked 
the  folk  he  met  there,  who  reminded  him  of  New 
England  country  folk.  He  liked  the  walks  in 
the  neighborhood  and  the  sounding  sea,  and  he 
was  wont  to  invite  to  his  lodgings  friends  whose 
companionship  he  cared  for.  An  appreciative  fol 
lower  in  Lowell's  footsteps  has  made  an  agree 
able  record  of  the  memories  he  left  behind  in 
Whitby,  especially  with  the  two  Misses  Gallillee, 
with  whom  he  lodged.2  The  paper  deals  with  the 
picturesque  properties  of  the  little  village,  and  has 
also  a  faint  fragrance  from  the  very  human  remi 
niscences  of  Lowell  that  remained  in  the  minds  of 
those  who  came  near  to  him.  "  In  the  eyes  of  the 
positive  little  person  —  an  innate  Yankee  of  York 
shire  blood  —  whose  duty  it  was  to  change  the 
courses  on  these  occasions,  literary  men  as  such 
have  no  glamour  at  all.  Her  acquaintance  in 
cludes  a  number,  and  her  North  Country  vocabu 
lary  has  terms  wherewith  to  dispose  of  them 

1  Letters,  ii.  337. 

2  See  "  A  Poet's  Yorkshire  Haunts,"  in  the  Atlantic  Monthly, 
August,  1895. 


RETURN  TO  PRIVATE  LIFE  357 

briefly.  But  there  is  neither  reservation  nor  quali 
fication  in  the  tone  in  which  she  says  of  the  con 
clusion  of  a  certain  discussion,  listened  to  between 
times  in  the  serving,  '  I  never  forgot  it.'  It  had 
wound  up  in  a  round-robin  agreement,  according 
to  which  each  person  present  was  to  say  by  what 
he  should  best  like  to  be  remembered.  The  host 
spoke  last,  and  the  sentence  in  which  his  admiring 
hearer  puts  him  on  record  is,  '  By  kindly  acts  and 
helpful  deeds.'  " 

Yet  much  at  home  as  he  was  in  Whitby,  Lowell 
could  not  well  resist  the  contagion  which  attacks 
all  summer  wanderers.  As  he  wrote  to  Lady 
Lyttleton  from  Whitby,  7  September :  "  I  am  a 
bird  of  passage  now,  and  that  makes  me  feel  un 
settled  wherever  I  am,  but  I  have  enjoyed  my  stay 
here,  and  the  hogsheads  of  fresh  air  I  have  drunk 
have  done  me  good.  ...  I  go  down  to  Somerset 
shire  on  Saturday  to  Mr.  Hobhouse,  who  has 
promised  to  show  me  Wells  Cathedral,  the  only 
one  in  England  I  have  not  seen.  Thence  I  go  to 
the  Stephens."  During  this  summer  he  was  fit 
fully  engaged  in  bringing  together  such  poems  as 
he  had  written  since  the  volume  "  Under  the  Wil 
lows,"  or  had  written  before  but  had  not  included 
in  that  volume,  and  he  continued  his  work  upon  it 
after  his  return  to  Deerfoot  Farm  in  the  fall.  He 
pondered  over  what  he  should  include,  what  leave 
out,  and  the  medley  which  resulted  caused  him,  in 
the  volume  "  Heartsease  and  Rue,"  to  distribute 
the  contents  without  regard  to  chronology  under 
a  variety  of  headings,  —  Friendship,  Sentiment, 


358  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

Fancy,  Humor  and  Satire,  Epigrams.  "  My  book 
will  be  a  raft  manned  by  the  press-gang,  I  fear," 
he  wrote.  "  There  will  be  some  hitherto  imprinted 
things  in  it  —  many  of  them  trifles  —  some  of 
which,  however,  please  my^  fancy  and  may  another's 
here  and  there."  As  he  went  on  with  the  work 
of  collection,  he  grew  more  and  more  distrustful. 
"I  feel,"  he  wrote  22  December,  1887,  "like  a 
young  author  at  his  first  venture.  I  think  there 
will  be  some  nice  things  in  the  book,  but  fear 
that  my  kind  of  thing  is  a  little  old-fashioned. 
People  want  sensation  rather  than  sense  nowadays." 
Again,  4  January,  1888,  he  writes :  "  I  am  wonder 
ing  more  and  more  if  my  poems  are  good  for  any 
thing  after  all.  They  are  old-fashioned  in  their 
simplicity  and  straightforwardness  of  style,  —  and 
everybody  writes  so  plaguily  well  nowadays.  I 
fear  that  I  left  off  my  diet  of  bee  bread  too  long 
and  have  written  too  much  prose.  A  poet  should  n't 
be,  nay,  he  can't  be  anything  else  without  loss  to 
him  as  poet,  however  much  he  may  gain  as  man." 

Yet  he  liked  the  little  task  of  collecting  the 
volume,  and  there  was  a  pleasurable  content  in  his 
uneventful  country  life  with  his  books  and  pipe. 
"  My  mind  is  busy,"  he  wrote,  "  and  I  like  it.  I 
am  sitting  in  the  sun  without  fire  and  I  like  that. 
My  pipe  tastes  good  and  I  like  that  too,  for  it 
enables  me  to  treat  with  indifference  some  alarums 
and  incursions  of  the  gout  which  I  was  sharply 
aware  of  yesterday  and  this  morning.  No  weather- 
sign  is  so  truthful  as  this :  If  your  pipe  is  savory, 
nothing  is  the  matter  with  you.  Put  that  in  your 
pipe  and  smoke  it !  " 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  359 

Lowell's  friendliness  showed  itself  in  the  in 
formal  visits  he  liked  to  make  to  his  friends  when 
he  was  in  town,  and  the  familiar  letters  he  wrote 
from  the  country.  He  was  rather  more  ready  to 
entertain  a  correspondent  with  a  bit  of  criticism 
than  to  heed  the  calls  made  on  him  by  editors  for 
the  same  kind  of  writing  done  with  formal  purpose. 
Thus  he  writes  to  Mrs.  Bell  from  Deerfoot  Farm, 
Thanksgiving  Day,  1887  :  "  A  second-rate  author 
two  hundred  years  old  has  a  great  advantage  over 
his  juniors  of  our  own  day.  If  he  himself  have  not 
the  merit  of  originality,  his  language  has  that  of 
quaintness  which  sometimes  gives  him  a  charm 
similar  in  its  effect  though  very  inferior  in  quality. 
I  think  this  is  true  of  Feltham,  though  it  be  now 
more  than  twenty  years  since  I  have  looked  into 
him.  I  had  read  him  in  the  day  of  my  supersti 
tion  when  one  takes  all  established  reputations  for 
granted,  and  read  him  over  again  after  Experience 
had  let  fall  her  fatal  clarifying  drops  into  my  eyes. 
Woe 's  me,  how  he  has  dwarfed !  I  wrote  my 
opinion  of  him  on  the  flyleaf  of  my  little  quarto 
edition,  and  all  I  can  recollect  of  him  is  that  I 
called  his  style  '  lousy  with  Latinisms.'  Pardon 
me.  Swift  was  still  read  when  I  was  young,  and 
how  resist  the  alliteration  ?  I  can  pardon  Browne's 
Latinisms,  nay,  his  GraBcisms  too,  and  even  like 
them.  They  are  resolved  in  the  powerful  men 
struum  of  his  thought.  They  are  farsought  and 
yet  seem  not  farfetched.  Feltham's  are  stuck-in 
like  plums  in  his  poor  pudding  and  make  the  dough 
more  dismal  by  contrast.  He  has  n't  stoned  them 


360  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

and  we  crush  between  our  teeth  something  hard 
and  out  of  place  that  leaves  an  acrid  taste  behind 
it.  I  remember  one  phrase  of  his  that  tickled  me 
—  the  '  spacious  ears  '  of  the  elephant.  It  fits  an 
other  animal,  and  sometimes  when  I  have  been  ass- 
fixiated  by  an  audience  I  have  been  tempted  to  beg 
of  them  to  '  lend  me  their  spacious  ears.' 

"  I  think  it  possible  that  I  gave  Longfellow  the 
references  to  him,  for  I  was  reading  him  about  the 
time  the  Dante  translation  was  going  on.  I  could 
tell  if  I  had  my  copy  here  and  could  take  a  look 
at  the  flyleaves. 

"  I  may  do  Feltham  wrong.  The  navicella  di 
nostro  ingenio  draws  more  water  as  we  grow 
older,  and  grounds  in  the  shallows  where  we  found 
good  water-fowling  in  our  youth. 

"  No  doubt  the  book  is  in  the  Athenaeum,  —  but 
wait,  please,  till  I  can  lend  you  my  copy.  It  is  at 
Elmwood,  and  I  can  get  it  after  I  come  back  from 
New  York,  whither  I  go  to  be  baited  for  the  bene 
fit  of  the  International  Copyright  League.  I  wish 
there  were  a  concise  and  elegant  Latinism  for 
D — n !  I  would  bring  it  in  gracefully  here. 

"  I  did  n't  mean  to  write  all  this  and  should  n't 
if  I  had  n't  had  something  else  I  ought  to  be  doing. 
How  tempting  the  duty  that  lies  farthest  from  us 
always  is,  to  be  sure  !  " 

It  may  have  struck  the  reader  how  little  com 
ment,  comparatively,  Lowell  made  during  his  life 
upon  his  fellows  in  American  literature.  We  must 
except  of  course  his  poetic  criticism  in  "  A  Fable 
for  Critics  "  and  "  Agassiz ;  "  but  in  his  prose  crit- 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  361 

icism  he  occupied  himself  most  constantly  with 
the  dead,  not  the  living.  When,  later,  he  spoke  on 
"  Our  Literature  "  at  the  Washington  Centennial 
in  New  York  he  confined  himself  to  generalities.  It 
is  worth  noting,  therefore,  that  on  an  occasion  when 
he  was  called  on  to  preside  at  an  Authors'  Reading 
for  the  benefit  of  the  Copyright  League l  he  pre 
faced  his  argument  for  an  international  copyright 
act  with  a  resume  of  the  course  of  American  litera 
ture,  and  some  more  specific  characterization  of  the 
contemporaries  with  whom  his  own  name  always 
will  be  associated.  As  a  somewhat  unwonted  per 
sonal  sketch,  even  though  scarcely  more  than  an 
off-hand  deliverance,  it  may  well  be  given  here  as 
one  of  the  last  of  Lowell's  public  addresses. 

"  When  I  was  beginning  life,  as  it  is  called,  —  as 
if  we  were  not  always  beginning  it !  —  the  question 
4  Who  reads  an  American  book  ? '  still  roused  in 
the  not  too  numerous  cultivated  class  among  us  a 
feeling  of  resentful  but  helpless  anger.  The  pens 
of  our  periodical  writers  fairly  sputtered  with  rage, 
and  many  a  hardly  suppressed  imprecation  might 
be  read  between  their  lines.  Their  position  was, 
in  truth,  somewhat  difficult.  We  had  had  Jona 
than  Edwards,  no  doubt ;  and  people  were  still 
living  who  thought  Barlow's  '  Hasty  Pudding '  a 
lightsome  jeu  d'esprit,  and  who  believed  that 
Dwight's  4  Conquest  of  Canaan '  was  a  long  stride 
towards  that  of  posterity  and  the  conversion  of  the 
heathen  there.  We  had  had  Freneau,  who  wrote  a 
single  line,  — 

1  Checkering-  Hall,  New  York,  28  November,  1887: 


362  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

'  The  hunter  and  the  deer  a  shade,' 

which  had  charmed  the  ear  and  cheated  the  mem 
ory  of  Scott  (I  think  it  was)  till  he  mistook  it  for 
his  own.  We  had  the  'Star  Spangled  Banner,' 
and  two  or  three  naval  ballads  which,  to  my  ear, 
have  the  true  rough  and  ready  tone.  Philip  Cook, 
of  Virginia,  had  written  a  few  graceful  and  musical 
lyrics.  We  had  4McFingal,'  as  near  its  model 
as  any  imitation  of  the  inimitable  can  be,  but 
far  indeed  from  that  intricate  subtlety  of  wit 
which  makes  '  Hudibras '  a  metaphysical  study  as 
well  as  an  intellectual  delight.  We  had  in  the 
'  Federalist '  a  mine  of  political  wisdom  by  which 
even  Burke  might  have  profited,  and  whose  golden 
veins  are  not  yet  exhausted,  as  foreign  statists  and 
jurists  are  beginning  to  discover.  But  of  true 
literature  we  had  next  to  nothing.  Of  what  we 
had,  Duyckinck's  scholarly  4  Cyclopaedia  of  Ameri 
can  Literature '  gives  us  an  almost  too  satisfactory 
notion.  Of  what  we  had  not,  there  was  none  to 
tell  us,  for  there  were  no  critics.  We  had  no  na 
tional  unity,  and  therefore  no  national  conscious 
ness,  and  it  is  one  of  the  first  conditions  of  a  virile 
and  characteristic  literature  that  it  should  feel 
solid  and  familiar  earth  under  its  feet.  New  Eng 
land  had  indeed  a  kind  of  unity,  but  it  was  a  pro 
vincial  unity,  and  those  hardy  commonwealths  that 
invented  democracy  were  not  and  could  not  yet  be 
quite  in  sympathy  with  the  new  America  that  was 
to  adopt  and  expand  it.  Literature  thrives  in  an 
air  laden  with  tradition,  in  a  soil  ripe  with  imme 
morial  culture,  in  the  temperature,  steady  and  stimu- 


RETURN  TO  PRIVATE  LIFE  363 

lating,  of  historic  associations.  We  had  none  of 
these.  What  semblance  we  had  of  them  was  Eng 
lish,  and  we  long  continued  to  bring  earth  from 
the  mother  -  country  to  pot  our  imported  plants 
with,  as  the  crusaders  brought  home  that  of  Pales 
tine  to  be  buried  in.  And  all  this  time  our  native 
oak  was  dropping  its  unheeded  acorns  into  the 
crannies  of  the  rock  where  by  and  by  their  sturdy 
roots  would  make  room  for  themselves  and  find 
fitting  nourishment. 

"  Never  was  young  nation  on  its  way  to  seek  its 
fortune  so  dumfounded  as  Brother  Jonathan  when 
John  Bull,  presenting  what  seemed  to  his  startled 
eyes  a  blunderbuss,  cried  gruffly  from  the  roadside, 
4  Stand,  and  deliver  a  literature  ! '  He  was  in  a 
'  pretty  fix,'  as  he  himself  would  have  called  it. 
After  fumbling  in  all  his  pockets,  he  was  obliged 
to  confess  that  he  had  n't  one  about  him  at  the 
moment,  but  vowed  that  he  had  left  a  beautiful 
one  at  home  which  he  would  have  fetched  along  — 
only  it  was  so  everlasting  heavy.  If  he  had  but 
known  it,  he  carried  with  him  the  pledge  of  what 
he  was  seeking  in  that  vernacular  phrase  '  fix,' 
which  showed  that  he  could  invent  a  new  word  for 
a  new  need  without  asking  leave  of  anybody. 

"Meanwhile  the  answer  to  Sydney  Smith's  scorn 
ful  question  was  shaping  itself.  Already  we  had 
Irving,  who  after  humorously  satirizing  the  poverty 
of  our  annals  in  his  '  Knickerbocker,'  forced  to 
feel  the  pensive  beauty  of  what  is  ancient  by  the 
painful  absence  of  it,  first  tried  to  create  an  arti 
ficial  antiquity  as  a  substitute,  and  then  sought  in 


364  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

the  old  world  a  kindlier  atmosphere  and  themes 
more  sympathetic  with  the  dainty  and  carefully 
shaded  phrase  he  loved.  He  first  taught  us  the 
everliving  charm  of  style,  most  invaluable  and  most 
difficult  of  lessons.  Almost  wholly  English,  he  is 
yet  our  earliest  classic,  still  loved  in  the  Old  Home 
and  the  New.  Then  came  Cooper,  our  first  radi 
cally  American  author,  with  the  defects  of  style 
that  come  of  half-culture,  but  a  man  of  robust 
genius  who,  after  a  false  start,  looked  about  him  to 
recognize  in  the  New  Man  of  the  New  World  an 
unhackneyed  and  unconventional  subject  for  Art. 
Brockden  Brown  had  shown  vivid  glimpses  of 
genius,  but  of  a  genius  haunted  by  the  phantasms 
of  imagination  and  conscious  of  those  substantial 
realities  they  mocked  only  as  an  opium  eater  might 
be.  His  models  were  lay  figures  shabby  from  their 
long  service  in  the  studios  of  Godwin  and  the  Ger 
mans.  Cooper  first  studied  from  the  life,  and  it 
was  the  homo  Americanus  with  our  own  limestone 
in  his  bones,  our  own  iron  in  his  blood,  that  sat  to 
him.  There  had  been  pioneers  before  him,  like 
Belknap  and  Breckenridge,  who  had,  in  woodman's 
phrase,  blazed  the  way  for  him,  but  he  found  new 
figures  in  the  forest,  autochthonous  figures,  and 
on  the  ocean,  whose  romance  he  was  the  first  to 
divine,  he  touched  a  nerve  of  patriotic  pride  that 
still  vibrates.  I  open  upon  my  boyhood  when 
I  chance  on  a  page  of  his  best.  In  prose  we  had 
also  Channing,  who  uttered  the  perceptions,  at 
once  delicate  and  penetrating  like  root  fibres,  of 
a  singularly  intuitive  mind  in  a  diction  of  sober 


RETURN   TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  365 

fervor  where  the  artist  sometimes  elbows  aside  the 
preacher ;  and  Webster,  the  massive  simplicity  of 
whose  language  and  the  unwavering  force  of  whose 
argument,  flashing  into  eloquent  flame  as  it  heated, 
recalled  to  those  who  listened  and  saw  before  them 
one  of  the  most  august  shapes  manhood  ever  put 
on,  no  inadequate  image  of  Pericles.  We  had 
little  more.  Emerson  was  still  letting  grow  or 
trying  in  short  flights  those  wings  that  were  to  lift 
him  and  us  to  Heaven's  sweetest  air.  Hawthorne, 
scarce  out  of  his  teens,  had  given  in  '  Fanshawe ' 
some  inkling  of  his  instinct  for  style  and  of  the 
direction  his  maturer  genius  was  to  choose,  but 
no  glimpse  of  that  creative  imagination,  the  most 
original  and  profound  of  these  latter  days.  Our 
masters  of  historical  narration  were  yet  to  come. 

"  In  poetry  we  were  still  to  seek.  Bryant's 
4  Waterfowl '  had  begun  that  immortal  flight  that 
will  be  followed  by  many  a  delighted  eye  long  after 
ours  shall  have  been  darkened ;  Dana  had  written 
some  verses  which  showed  a  velleity  for  better  and 
sincerer  things ;  Willis  was  frittering  away  a  natu 
ral  and  genuine  gift ;  Longfellow  was  preluding 
that  sweet,  pure,  and  sympathetic  song  which  per 
suaded  so  many  Englishmen  that  he  must  be  a 
countrymen  of  theirs.  In  his  case  the  question 
certainly  became  not  '  Who  reads  an  American 
book  ? '  but  4  Who  does  not  read  one  ? '  Holmes 
had  written  one  imperishable  poem. 

"  This  was  the  state  of  things  when  I  was  a  boy. 
That  old  question,  once  so  cruelly  irritating,  be 
cause  it  was  so  cruelly  to  the  point,  has  long  ago 


366  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

lost  its  sting.  When  I  look  round  me  on  this  plat 
form,  I  see  a  company  of  authors  whose  books  are 
read  wherever  English  is  read,  and  some  whose 
books  are  read  in  languages  that  are  other  than 
their  own.  The  American  who  lounges  over  an 
English  railway-book-stall  while  his  train  is  mak- 
ing-up  sees  almost  as  many  volumes  with  names 
of  his  countrymen  on  their  backs  as  he  sees  of  na 
tive  authors.  American  Literature  has  asserted 
and  made  good  its  claim  to  a  definite  place  in 
the  world.  Sixty  years  ago  there  were  only  two 
American  authors,  Irving  and  Cooper,  who  could 
have  lived  by  their  literary  incomes,  and  they  for 
tunately  had  other  sources  of  revenue.  There  are 
now  scores  who  find  in  letters  a  handsome  estate. 
Our  literature  has  developed  itself  out  of  English 
literature,  as  our  political  forms  have  developed 
themselves  out  of  English  political  forms,  but  with 
a  difference.  Not  as  parasitic  plants  fed  from  the 
parent  stock,  but  only  as  new  growths  from  seeds 
the  mother  tree  has  dropped,  could  they  have  pros 
pered  as  they  have  done.  And  so  our  literature 
is  a  part  of  English  literature  and  must  always 
continue  to  be  so,  but,  as  I  have  said,  with  a  dif 
ference.  What  that  difference  is,  it  would  be  very 
hard  to  define,  though  it  be  something  of  which  we 
are  very  sensible  when  we  read  an  American  book. 
We  are,  I  think,  especially  sensible  of  it  in  the 
biography  of  any  of  our  countrymen,  as  I  could 
not  help  feeling  as  I  read  that  admirable  one  of 
Emerson  by  Mr.  Cabot.  There  was  nothing  Eng 
lish  in  the  conditions  which  shaped  the  earlier  part 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE   LIFE  367 

of  Emerson's  life.  Something  Scottish  there  was, 
it  may  be  said,  but  the  later  life  at  Concord  which 
was  so  beautiful  in  its  noble  simplicity,  in  its  frugal 
ity  never  parsimonious,  and  practised  to  secure  not 
wealth  but  independence,  that  is  —  or  must  we 
say  was  ?  —  thoroughly  American.  Without  pre 
tension,  without  swagger,  with  the  need  of  pro 
claiming  itself,  and  with  no  affectation  of  that 
commonness  which  our  late  politicians  seem  to 
think  especially  dear  to  a  democracy,  it  represented 
whatever  was  peculiar  and  whatever  was  best  in 
the  novel  inspirations  of  our  soil.  These  inspira 
tions  began  to  make  themselves  felt  early  in  our 
history  and  I  think  I  find  traces  of  their  influence 
even  so  long  ago  as  the  '  Simple  Cobbler  of  Aga- 
wam,'  published  in  1647.  Its  author,  Ward,  had 
taken  his  second  degree  at  Cambridge  and  was  a 
man  past  middle  life  when  he  came  over  to  Massa 
chusetts,  but  I  think  his  book  would  have  been  a 
different  book  had  he  written  it  in  England.  This 
Americanism  which  is  there  because  we  cannot 
help  it,  not  put  there  because  it  is  expected  of  us, 
gives,  I  think,  a  new  note  to  our  better  literature 
and  is  what  makes  it  fresh  and  welcome  to  foreign 
ears.  We  have  developed,  if  we  did  not  invent,  a 
form  of  racy,  popular  humor,  as  original  as  it  is 
possible  for  anything  to  be,  which  has  found  ideal 
utterance  through  the  genius  of  '  Mark  Twain.'  I 
confess  that  I  look  upon  this  general  sense  of  the 
comic  among  our  people  and  the  ready  wit  which 
condenses  it  into  epigram,  as  one  of  the  safe 
guards  of  our  polity.  If  it  be  irreverent  it  is  not 


368  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

superstitious  ;  it  has  little  respect  for  phrases  ;  and 
no  nonsense  can  long  look  it  in  the  eye  without 
flinching." 

"  Heartsease  and  Rue "  was  published  in  the 
early  spring  of  1888.  and  immediately  afterward 
Lowell  printed  in  the  Atlantic  his  poem  "  Turner's 
Old  Temeraire,  under  a  Figure  symbolizing  the 
Church."  This  poem  and  "  How  I  consulted  the 
Oracle  of  the  Goldfishes,"  which  appeared  in  the 
Atlantic  for  August,  1889,  were  printed  in  the  thin 
posthumous  volume  of  "  Last  Poems,"  and  belong 
thus  in  the  group  which  most  effectively  represents 
Lowell's  mood  on  the  profoundest  themes  at  the 
end  of  his  life.  The  first  poem  in  "  Heartsease 
and  Rue,"  that  on  Agassiz,  which  heads  the  section 
entitled  Friendship,  has  already  been  noted  in  con 
nection  with  the  time  when  it  was  written.  A  little 
of  the  same  pathos  of  parting  with  old  friends  is  in 
the  postscript  of  the  letter  to  Curtis,  and  in  this  as 
in  the  former,  the  poet's  mind  runs  on  naturally  in 
its  speculation  to  the  new  To  Be.  A  single  hint 
of  a  thought  which  filled  many  of  Lowell's  hours 
occurs  in  the  poem  when  he  says :  — 

"  With  bits  of  wreck  I  patch  the  boat  shall  bear 
Me  to  that  unexhausted  Otherwhere ;  " 

but  it  is  in  the  group  of  poems  referred  to  above 
that  one  sees  most  clearly  a  recurrence  to  the 
great  underlying  questions  of  faith.  With  a  half- 
mocking  smile  Lowell  asks  in  "  Credidimus  Jovem 
regnare  "  if  science  has  found  the  key  which  re 
ligion  has  lost,  and  falls  back  on  the  somewhat 


RETURN   TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  369 

lame  conclusion  that  he  had  best  keep  his  key, 
which  may  be  but  a  rusty  inheritance,  on  the 
chance  that  the  door  and  lock  may  some  day  be 
made  to  fit  the  key.  Again,  in  the  poem  "  How  I 
consulted  the  Oracle  of  the  Goldfishes,"  where  he 
muses  over  the  realities  and  illusions  of  the  spirit 
ual  world,  he  does  not  deny  the  doubts  that  have 
arisen  in  his  own  mind,  but  after  all  refuses  to  per 
mit  even  his  doubts  to  dismay  him. 

"  Here  shall  my  resolution  be  : 
The  shadow  of  the  mystery 
Is  haply  wholesomer  for  eyes 
That  cheat  us  to  be  over-wise, 
And  I  am  happy  in  my  sight 
To  love  God's  darkness  as  His  light." 

Nor  will  he  allow  himself,  even  when  contemplating 
what  he  regards  as  the  obscuration  of  the  Church's 
light,  to  look  upon  this  as  the  last  state  of  organic 
faith.  He  takes  that  noble  painting  by  Turner, 
"The  Fighting  Temeraire  tugged  to  her  last  berth, 
to  be  broken  up,"  and  sees  science,  "  a  black  de 
mon,  belching  fire  and  steam,"  drag  it  away  "  to 
gather  weeds  in  the  regardless  stream."  Ruskin 
makes  the  picture  an  unconscious  expression  by  the 
painter  of  his  own  return  to  die  by  the  shore  of 
the  Thames,  "  the  cold  mists  gathering  over  his 
strength,  and  all  men  crying  out  against  him,  and 
dragging  the  old  '  Fighting  Temeraire  '  out  of  their 
way,  with  dim,  fuliginous  contumely  ;  "  but  surely 
this  is  rather  the  passionate  comment  of  a  disciple 
making  his  master's  work  prophetic.  Lowell's 
poem  strikes  a  deeper  than  a  personal  note.  It  is 
a  fine  imaginative  conception,  a  rare  interpretation 


370  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

of  a  great  work  of  art  by  another  work  of  art,  and 
what  is  noticeable  in  the  cry  of  the  poem  is  the  pro 
test  which  Lowell,  in  his  instinctive  faith,  makes 
against  the  finality  of  his  own  interpretation.  He 
sees  in  imagination  the  splendid  history  of  the 
church,  and  no  fighter  under  Nelson  could  have 
witnessed  this  desolate  funeral  of  the  great  ship 
with  more  anguish  than  Lowell  has  thrown  into  his 
pathetic  words  ;  but  as  the  English  sailor  could 
have  righted  himself  with  a  vision  of  the  glories  of 
the  future  English  navy,  so  Lowell  closes  his  dirge 
with  a  triumphant  prophecy :  — 

"  Shall  nevermore,  engendered  of  thy  fame, 
A  new  sea-eagle  heir  thy  conqueror  name, 
And  with  commissioned  talons  wrench 
From  thy  supplanter's  grimy  clench 
His  sheath  of  steel,  his  wings  of  smoke  and  flame  ? 

"  This  shall  the  pleased  eyes  of  our  children  see ; 
For  this  the  stars  of  God  long  even  as  we ; 
Earth  listens  for  his  wings  ;  the  Fates 
Expectant  lean ;  Faith  cross-propt  waits, 
And  the  tired  waves  of  Thought's  insurgent  sea."  * 

1  In  one  of  the  verses  of  this  poem  Lowell  had  used  the  pictur 
esque  phrase  :  — 

"  Let  the  bull-fronted  surges  glide 
Caressingly  along  thy  side, 
Like  glad  hounds  leaping  by  the  huntsman's  knees." 

In  answer  to  a  criticism  from  a  friend,  he  wrote :  "  There  is  no 
mixed  metaphor.  I  don't  compare  the  waves  to  bulls,  but  merely 
say  they  are  bull-fronted,  —  and  so  they  are,  with  the  foam  curl 
ing  over  between  their  horns  as  in  the  bulls  which  I  have  often 
interviewed  in  the  pastures  here  —  with  a  stout  stone  wall  between 
us  viersteht  sich.  That  I  afterward  say  they  leap  like  hounds  im 
plies  no  confusion  of  images.  My  dog  Vixen  has  a  bull-front,  if 
ever  there  was  one,  and  is  always  leaping  about  my  knees,  as  my 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  371 

In  taking  another  great  painting  as  the  prompter 
of  his  verse,  Titian's  so-called  "  Sacred  and  Pro 
fane  Love,"  Lowell  again  is  not  so  much  interpret 
ing  the  painter's  thought  as  he  is  using  the  canvas 
for  a  mirror  in  which  to  read  his  own  soul,  and 
though  in  printing  "  Endymion  "  he  adds  the  gloss 
"  a  mystical  comment,"  one  may  guess  that  Lowell 
in  this  twilight  of  his  life,  musing  upon  the  ideals 
which  had  beckoned  him  from  earliest  days,  still 
saw  in  the  heavens  that  vision  of  beauty,  of  truth, 
and  of  freedom  which  had  never  been  dethroned  in 
his  soul.  Faithfulness  to  high  emprise,  —  that  at 
least  he  could  declare  of  himself  amidst  all  the 
doubt  that  beclouded  his  intellectual  vision,  and 
it  was  fitting  that  the  poet  should,  in  this  veiled 
figure  of  Endymion,  see  the  reflection  of  his  own 
face  and  form. 

In  sending  "  Endymion  "  to  his  publishers  for  in 
sertion  in  the  volume  "  Heartsease  and  Rue,"  Low 
ell  had  written  from  Deerfoot  Farm,  20  December, 
1887 :  "  I  hoped  to  have  sent  this  ['  Endymion  '] 
by  Monday  morning's  post,  but  for  two  days  after 
my  return  my  head  continued  to  be  cloggy  and  my 
vein  would  n't  flow.  I  have  at  last  managed  to 
give  what  seems  to  me  as  much  consecutiveness  as 
they  need  to  what  have  been  a  heap  of  fragments 

trousers  can  testify.     saw  the  waves  and  heard  'em  butt 

against  the  prow.  Ask  her.  I  always  see  what  I  describe  while 
I  am  thinking1  of  it.  I  see  the  waves  now,  as  if  I  were  in  mid 
ocean  on  board  the  good  barque  Sultana  in  '51."  To  the  same 
friend  he  wrote  a  month  later  :  "  I  am  glad  you  found  something 
in  the  Te'me'raire  for  all  that,  —  or  try  to  be  glad.  But  when  I 
saw  it  in  print,  it  saddened  me." 


372  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

in  my  note-books  for  years.  Longer  revolution  in 
my  head  might  round  it  better,  but  take  it  as  a 
meteorolite,  splintery  still,  but  with  some  metallic 
iridescence  here  and  there  brought  from  some  vol 
canic  star.  Let  it  come  among  poems  of  senti 
ment,  and  as  the  longest,  first  if  possible." 

He  was  still  looking  forward  at  this  time  to  full 
labors.  He  had  been  urged  by  his  publishers  to 
undertake  the  volume  on  Hawthorne  in  the  Ameri 
can  Men  of  Letters  series.  He  had  signified  his 
assent  in  general,  some  time  before,  and  seemed 
now  to  be  deliberately  contemplating  the  task,  for 
he  wrote  four  days  after  the  last :  — 

"  I  think  there  have  been  one  or  two  volumes 
published  within  a  few  years  about  old  Salem.  I 
should  be  glad  to  have  them  sent  to  me  at  South- 
borough.  I  have  one  little  job  of  writing  to  finish, 
after  which  I  shall  revise  my  poems  and  prose  for 
a  new  edition.  I  don't  know  whether  it  be  second 
childhood,  but  I  am  beginning  to  take  an  interest 
in  them.  Then  I  mean  to  take  up  Hawthorne  in 
earnest.  ..." 

Before  "  Heartsease  and  Hue "  was  published 
Lowell  had  begun  the  task  of  setting  in  order  all 
his  writings.  With  some  hesitation  he  published 
in  the  spring  of  1888  a  volume  of  "  Political  Es 
says,"  in  which  he  gathered  the  articles  printed  in 
the  Atlantic  and  North  American  Review  during 
the  stormy  war  period,  but  he  added  as  the  final 
number  his  address  on  "  The  Independent  in  Poli 
tics,"  given  in  New  York,  13  April,  1888.  It  may 
be  noted  that,  with  no  apparent  definiteness  of  pur- 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  373 

pose,  Lowell  did  in  the  closing  years  of  his  life 
sum  up,  in  forms  which  occasions  for  the  most  part 
suggested,  his  leading  principles  and  doctrines,  as 
if  in  a  series  of  valedictories.  Thus  "  Democracy  " 
was  a  confession  of  his  fundamental  belief  in  the 
region  of  world-politics ;  his  address  at  Harvard 
was  the  one  word  on  scholarship  which  at  the  end 
of  a  scholar's  life  he  most  wished  to  say ;  his  ad 
dress  before  the  Copyright  League  had  touched  on 
points  in  the  great  theme  of  literature  which  had 
been  of  lifelong  interest ;  in  his  serious  poetry,  as 
we  have  seen,  he  touched  upon  those  great  themes 
of  both  worlds  which,  as  a  seer  of  visions  all  his 
life,  he  could  not  fail  to  find  deepening  in  his 
thought ;  and  now  he  took  the  opportunity  fur 
nished  by  a  friendly  audience  to  set  forth  some  of 
those  principles  which  had  formed  his  rule  of  con 
duct  throughout  a  life  that  had  found  active  employ 
ment  in  citizenship.  There  is  no  lack  of  definite- 
ness  in  this  address,  and  yet  the  period  just  before 
its  delivery,  when  he  may  be  supposed  to  have  pre 
pared  it,  was  one  of  even  unwonted  depression. 

"  It  is  n't  pleasant  to  think  one's  self  a  failure 
at  seventy,"  he  wrote  27  March,  1888,  "  and  yet 
that 's  the  way  it  looks  to  me  most  of  the  time.  I 
can't  do  my  best.  That 's  the  very  torment  of  it. 
Why  not  reconcile  one's  self  with  being  second- 
rate  ?  Is  n't  it  better  than  nothing  ?  No,  't  is 
being  nowhere."  And  on  being  expostulated  with, 
he  wrote  again  :  "  It  is  n't  the  praise  I  care  for 
(though  of  course  I  should  like  it  as  well  as  Milton 
did,  I  suppose),  —  I  mean  the  praise  of  others,  — 


374  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

but  what  I  miss  is  a  comfortable  feeling  of  merit 
in  myself.  I  have  never  even  opened  my  new  book 
since  it  was  published  —  I  have  n't  dared." 

It  would  be  idle  to  seek  too  narrowly  for  the 
causes  of  this  despondency.  As  we  have  had 
frequent  occasion  to  note,  Lowell  all  his  life  was 
subject  to  fluctuation  of  moods.  The  most  com 
prehensive  cause  was  no  doubt  in  the  very  con 
stitution  of  his  temperament,  and  as  he  was  over 
clouded  at  times,  so  for  him  the  sun  when  it  shone 
was  more  brilliant  than  to  many.  But  one  asks 
most  anxiously,  are  such  moods  superficial  or  do 
they  trench  upon  the  very  citadel  of  being,  sap 
ping  and  mining  the  walls,  so  that  if  entrance  is 
made,  the  very  heart  stops  beating.  In  all  the 
shifting  of  Lowell's  mind  there  were  great  funda 
mental  beliefs  from  which  he  would  not  be  sepa 
rated.  It  may  be  that  in  those  deepest  laid  foun 
dations  of  being,  where  the  bed-rock  of  faith  in 
spiritual  realities  is  discovered  to  be  a  ledge  of 
the  rock  of  ages,  Lowell  finally,  as  we  have  seen, 
t  confessed  to  an  ultimate  expression  of  faith,  which 
was  that  of  a  child  in  the  dark ;  but  how  was  it  as 
regards  that  firm  belief  in  his  country  which  had 
been  a  passion  with  him  all  his  days,  and  was  in 
truth  an  elemental  faith  with  him  ?  It  is  hard  to 
read  his  last  political  discourse,  "  The  Place  of  the 
Independent  in  Politics,"  without  a  little  sense  of 
pain  mingled  with  one's  admiration  for  the  serenity 
of  the  temper  with  which  Lowell  made  what  was 
in  effect  a  confession  of  his  political  faith ;  for 
when  one  comes  to  rest  his  hopes  for  his  country 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  375 

in  the  remnant,  he  confesses  almost  to  as  much 
doubt  as  confidence.  It  must  of  course  be  remem 
bered  that  Lowell  had  given  expression  to  his  large 
faith  in  democracy  in  his  Birmingham  address,  and 
he  calls  the  attention  of  his  audience  to  this  as  an 
explanation  of  the  terms  in  which  he  is  to  address 
his  own  countrymen.  He  might  properly  use  a 
note  of  warning  among  a  people  whose  cardinal 
doctrine  was  the  democratic  principle,  and  he 
was  justified  unquestionably  in  giving  frankly  his 
impressions  of  the  low  point  to  which  political  or 
ganizations  had  fallen.  Still,  in  undertaking  to 
account  for  the  evolution  of  the  democratic  idea 
in  American  life,  he  was  questioning  whether 
after  all  opportunity  had  not  much  to  do  with  it, 
and  whether  now  that  the  walls  were  closing  about 
this  new  country,  the  force  of  evolution  had  not 
been  largely  spent.  The  dangers  imminent  in  the 
constant  inflow  of  an  ignorant  body  of  foreigners, 
in  the  easy  good-nature  with  which  the  American 
tolerated  abuses,  and  in  the  aristocratic  character 
of  a  civil  service  as  diseased  as  the  rotten  borough 
of  English  politics,  —  these  dangers  rose  before 
him,  threatening,  alarming.  He  had  lost  faith 
largely  in  the  organic  action  of  parties,  chiefly  be 
cause  he  saw  in  them  the  passive  instruments  of 
unscrupulous  politicians ;  and  he  found  the  correc 
tion  of  this  great  evil  in  the  increasing  power  of  a 
neutral  body.  He  even  went  so  far  as  to  find  the 
only  hope  of  salvation  in  the  action  of  the  Inde 
pendents.  "If  the  attempt  should  fail,"  the 
attempt  that  is  to  reform  the  parties  from  without, 


376  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

"  the  failure  of  the  experiment  of  democracy  would 
inevitably  follow." 

This  is  not  the  place  to  discuss  the  merits  of 
such  a  question.  What  I  wish  is  to  show  the 
working  of  Lowell's  mind  on  those  political  sub 
jects  which  had  occupied  him  from  boyhood.  He 
was  consistent  throughout  in  holding  lightly  to  any 
allegiance  to  party,  and  in  valuing  highly  the  in 
tegrity  of  the  individual  conscience,  and  his  plea, 
gathering  force  as  it  proceeds,  is  for  such  a  spirit 
of  devotion  to  the  great  ideals  of  the  country  as 
shall  compel  the  union  of  like-minded  patriots  in 
accomplishing  the  great  active  reforms  that  press 
upon  the  minds  of  thoughtful  men. 

"  What  we  want,"  he  says  in  conclusion,  "  is  an 
active  class  who  will  insist  in  season  and  out  of 
season  that  we  shall  have  a  country  .  .  .  whose 
very  name  shall  not  only,  as  now  it  does,  stir  us  as 
with  the  sound  of  a  trumpet,  but  shall  call  out  all 
that  is  best  within  us  by  offering  us  the  radiant 
image  of  something  better  and  nobler  and  more 
enduring  than  we,  of  something  that  shall  fulfil 
our  own  thwarted  aspiration,  when  we  are  but  a 
handful  of  forgotten  dust  in  the  soil  trodden  by  a 
race  whom  we  shall  have  helped  to  make  more 
worthy  of  their  inheritance  than  we  ourselves  had 
the  power,  I  might  almost  say  the  means,  to  be." 

No,  Lowell's  last  word  to  his  countrymen  in 
domestic  politics  was  not  one  of  despair,  however 
it  may  have  been  tinged  with  a  sense  of  temporary 
defeat.  It  was  because  of  his  strong  love  that  he 
was  jealous  of  the  honor  of  his  country.  The  sad- 


RETURN  TO   PRIVATE  LIFE  377 

ness  is  that  of  one  weary  in  the  fight,  but  the  last 
note,  as  in  the  other  instances  of  his  valedictories, 
was  a  call  to  action  and  the  reassertion  of  his 
undying  faith  in  his  country.  Yet,  as  in  the  other 
instances,  there  is  the  pathetic  note  of  faith  in  spite 
of  the  evidence  of  sight. 

Once  again,  a  little  later  than  this,  he  was  called 
on  to  preside  at  a  dinner  of  the  Civil  Service 
Reform  Association,  and  something  of  what  he 
then  said  may  be  quoted  as  showing  how  hope  and 
courage  came  to  the  front  with  him  when  great 
national  issues  were  in  question.  "  If  I  am  some 
times  inclined  to  fancy,"  he  then  said,  "  as  old  men 
will,  that  the  world  I  see  about  me  is  not  so  plea 
sant  as  that  on  which  my  eyes  first  opened,  yet  I 
am  bound  to  admit  on  cross-examining  myself, 
that  it  is  on  the  whole  a  better  world,  better  espe 
cially  in  the  wider  distribution  of  the  civilized  and 
civilizing  elements  which  compose  it,  better  for  the 
increased  demands  made  upon  it  by  those  who  were 
once  dumb  and  helpless  and  for  their  increasing 
power  to  enforce  those  demands.  But  every  ad 
vance  in  the  right  direction  which  I  have  witnessed 
has  seemed  painfully  slow.  And  painfully  slow  it 
was,  if  measured,  as  we  are  apt  to  measure,  by  the 
standard  of  our  own  little  lives,  and  not,  as  we 
should,  by  that  larger  life  of  the  community  which 
can  afford  to  wait. 

"  Every  reform  like  that  in  which  we  are  inter 
ested  has  to  contend  with  vested  interests,  and  of  all 
vested  interests  abuses  are  those  which  are  most 
adroit  in  putting  a  specious  gloss  on  their  monopo- 


378  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

lies  and  most  unscrupulous  as  to  the  weapons  to  be 
used  in  their  defence.  The  evil  system  which  we 
would  fain  replace  with  a  better  has  gone  on  so 
long  that  it  almost  seems  part  of  the  order  of  na 
ture.  It  is  a  barbarous  and  dangerous  system. 
When  I  was  in  Spain  I  saw  reason  to  think  that 
the  decay  of  that  noble  nation,  due,  no  doubt,  to 
many  causes,  was  due  above  all  to  a  Civil  Service 
like  our  own  that  had  gone  farther  on  the  inevita 
ble  road  which  ours  is  going. 

"  It  should  seem  that  a  reform  like  ours,  so  reason 
able,  so  convenient,  so  economical,  would  at  once 
commend  itself  to  the  good  sense  of  the  people. 
And  I  think  there  are  manifest  signs  that  it  is 
more  and  more  so  commending  itself.  The  hu 
manity  of  our  day  is  willing  (as  our  ancestors  were 
not)  that  the  state  should  support  its  inefficient 
members.  But  did  humorist  ever  conceive  a  more 
wasteful  way  of  supporting  them  than  by  paying 
them  salaries  for  performing  ill  the  minor  and 
more  mechanical  functions  of  government,  thus 
making  this  inefficiency  costly  to  every  one  of  us  in 
his  daily  affairs  ?  Even  supposing  them  capable  of 
becoming  efficient,  the  chances  are  that,  just  when 
they  have  learned  their  business,  they  will  be  dis 
missed  to  make  room  for  other  apprentices  to  pass 
through  the  same  routine.  My  own  experience  has 
convinced  me  that  not  only  our  social  credit,  but 
our  business  interests  have  suffered  greatly  by  the 
theory  still  more  or  less  prevalent  that  a  man  good 
for  nothing  else  was  just  the  thing  for  one  of  the 
smaller  foreign  consulates." 


CHAPTER   XVII 

THE   LAST   YEARS 

1888-1891 

LOWELL  went  again  to  England  in  the  spring 
of  1888,  and  in  June  to  Bologna,  where  he  was  a 
delegate  from  Harvard  on  the  occasion  of  the  cele 
bration  of  the  eight  hundredth  anniversary  of  the 
foundation  of  the  University.  He  received  from 
Bologna  the  degree  of  Doctor  of  Letters.  He  left 
London  for  the  continent  on  Saturday  the  9th  of 
June  and  was  back  in  a  week.  He  had  a  most  un 
comfortable  experience,  being  attacked  severely  by 
the  enemy  which  now  seemed  to  be  always  lying  in 
wait  for  him.  He  gave  an  outline  of  his  discom 
fiture  in  a  letter  written  to  Mr.  Norton  three  weeks 
after  his  return  to  London. 

"  My  gout  began  in  Bologna.  It  announced 
itself  on  Tuesday  by  an  illness  which  prevented 
me  from  venturing  out,  and  so  a  very  pretty  speech 
in  Italian  which  I  had  in  my  head  remained  there 
to  the  great  loss  of  mankind.  Doctor  Weir  Mitch 
ell  l  came  to  me  at  once  on  hearing  of  my  disorder, 
so  that  I  was  able  to  be  out  next  day  to  receive  my 
degree  with  the  rest.  As  I  walked  home  from  the 

1  Dr.  Mitchell  likewise  received  an  honorary  degree  in  medicine 
from  the  University  of  Bologna  on  this  occasion. 


380  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

ceremony  I  found  myself  very  lame  and  foreboded 
what  was  coming  to  pass.  I  got  off  with  Story  to 
Milan  by  the  train  leaving  Bologua  at  1  A.  M.  I 
spent  Thursday  in  Milan,  where  I  provided  myself 
with  felt  slippers,  and  next  day  started  for  London 
to  escape  being  ill  in  an  Italian  inn.  I  got  through 
the  thirty-one  hours'  journey  fairly  well  with  the 
help  of  the  Glasgow  delegates  Ramsay  and  Fergu 
son,  who  helped  me  in  every  way.  I  don't  think 
my  journey  did  me  any  harm.  By  the  time  I 
reached  Calais  on  Saturday  I  was  able  to  get  on 
my  boot  again  and  thought  I  had  got  over  the 
worst,,  but  next  day  I  had  to  resign  myself  to  my 
sofa,  and  for  ten  days  was  in  intense  pain.  The 
whole  foot  in  every  joint  and  the  ankle  were  in 
flamed.  For  three  days  the  other  foot  (in  the  toe 
joint  only)  took  sides  with  its  mate,  and  I  was  dis 
couraged.  This,  however,  passed  off,  and  last 
Thursday  [5  July]  I  was  able  to  be  dressed.  To 
day  I  have  my  boots  on,  though  stropeato.  Ecce 
tutte" 

He  was  in  Whitby  again  in  August,  living  as  he 
liked  so  well  now  to  do  with  his  books  and  letters 
and  few  friends  and  the  walks  which  were  little 
more  than  easy  strolls.  He  wrote  to  his  friend 
Mrs.  Leslie  Stephen  who  was  at  St.  Ives  in  Corn 
wall  :  "  I  am  still  pretty  lame  (do  you  know  I  be 
gin  to  think  that  I  am  really  seventy  at  last,  and 
not  playing  that  I  am)  and  can  take  only  short 
walks.  But  I  hope  that  the  air  here  will  gradually 
blow  the  years  out  of  me  again.  And  the  fish  diet, 
too,  a  far  more  invigorating  animal  here  than  in 


THE   LAST  YEARS  381 

your  sleepy  Southern  waters  which  have  done  no 
thing  but  sun  themselves  and  doze  since  Sir 
Cloudesley  Shovel's  days.  What  are  your  pilchards 
when  you  contrive  to  catch  'em,  and  your  gurnards 
(of  which  latter  indeed  nothing  is  left  but  a  petri 
fied  head  fit  only  for  the  table  of  a  geologist  that 
ever  I  heard  of)  to  our  cod  and  whiting  and  ling, 
to  speak  of  no  others,  with  their  flesh  hardened  by 
constant  struggle  with  our  cold  Northern  waters  ? 
Why,  your  poor  fellows  have  to  come  all  the  way 
hither  to  catch  even  a  herring,  while  we  have  them 
fresh  from  the  sea  every  morning.  I  wish  I  could 
send  you  a  few  as  we  know  them.  And  where  is 
your  Abbey  ?  We  are  under  the  special  protection 
of  B.  V.  Sanctse  HildaB  with  the  added  flavor  in 
our  prayers  that  she  was  a  king's  daughter  and 
therefore  of  our  set,  and  with  that  sympathy  for 
our  special  infirmities  that  comes  of  knowledge. 
If  you  have  any  saint 't  is  some  fellow  with  a  name 
you  can't  pronounce,  and  who  understands  nothing 
but  Cornish,  whereas  Hilda  spoke  English,  as 
Freeman  has  proved  over  and  over  again." 

To  Mr.  Norton,  who  had  been  advising  with 
him  on  some  points  in  the  translation  of  Dante,  he 
wrote  from  Whitby  :  "  You  put  me  some  pretty 
stiff  conundrums,  but  I  will  try.  .  .  .  The  swoon 
at  the  end  of  the  canto  (Inferno  III.)  is  a  nut  too 
hard  for  my  hammer.  I  have  turned  it  and  tapped 
it  on  every  corner  that  seemed  hopeful  without 
making  so  much  as  a  crack  in  it.  Tambernic  and 
Pietrapana  might  fall  on  it  in  vain.  I  must  have 
expressed  myself  clumsily  in  my  last  letter.  I  did 


382  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

not  mean  to  counsel  paraphrase  in  the  text,  but  at 
foot  of  page  for  the  help  of  the  Philistine  to  whom 
all  poetry  is  a  dead  language.  At  best  the  transla 
tion  of  a  poem  is  a  waxen  image  of  the  living  origi 
nal,  and  being  too  literal  is  to  dress  it  in  the  very 
clothes  it  wore  as  if  the  reality  were  in  them. 

"  I  do  not  know  whether  I  told  you  that  my  last 
attack  of  gout  had  left  me  more  infirm  than  ever 
before.  I  am  still  lame  in  both  feet,  though  I  in 
sist  on  walking  in  the  hope  of  getting  limber  and 
because  without  exercise  I  can't  sleep.  We  have 
had  disastrous  weather  here,  a  cold  of  Antenora, 
with  fierce  winds  to  drive  it  in.  Even  the  stones 
of  the  Abbey  seem  to  feel  it  and  shudder.  jfl  am 
sitting  by  a  fire  as  I  write.  For  the  first  time  I 
begin  to  think  myself  capable  of  growing  old.1 - 

"  I  am  in  the  same  lodgings  as  last  year,  which 
is  a  pleasure  to  me,  with  kind,  simple  people,  who 
do  all  they  can  to  make  me  happy.  They  are  very 
like  our  New  England  country  folk,  except  in  ac 
cent,  —  almost  the  same  thing  in  fact." 

In  this  letter  Lowell  intimates  one  of  the  physi 
cal  ills  that  were  attacking  him,  the  loss  of  sleep. 
One  of  his  friends  and  admirers,  Canon  Stubbs, 
gave  this  reminiscence,2  not  long  after  Lowell's 
death.  "  Some  years  ago,"  he  writes,  "  I  was  in 
the  habit  of  meeting  him  from  time  to  time  at  the 
country  house  of  a  common  friend.  One  especial 

1  In  a  note  to  me  at  the  same  time  he  wrote  :  "  I  begin  to  ex 
amine  my  cards  curiously,  expecting-  to  find  that  of  Old  Age  over- 
looked  in  some  corner." 

2  The  Westminster  Gazette,  21  August,  1893. 


THE  LAST  YEARS  383 

evening  —  a  '  golden  night  of  memory '  —  I  shall 
never  forget.  After  dinner  one  of  the  guests  asked 
Lowell  to  read  one  of  his  own  poems.  This  re 
quest  he  playfully  put  aside,  but  he  began  to  talk 
to  us  about  Wordsworth,  and  read  to  us  part  of 
the  '  Laodamia,'  commenting,  as  he  read,  much  I 
confess  to  my  surprise,  on  the  narrowness  and  lim 
ited  experience  of  Wordsworth,  and  the  one-sided 
development  of  his  intellectual  powers.  Then 
some  chance  expression  turned  the  current  of  his 
talk,  and  he  began  describing,  with  all  the  quaint 
humor  and  delightful  raillery  of  which  he  was  so 
complete  a  master,  a  special  antidote  to  sleepless 
ness  which  he  said  he  had  himself  lately  devised,  — 
the  invention  of  new  chapters  in  Caesar's  Commen 
taries  on  the  Gallic  War.  I  wish  I  could  remem 
ber  the  chapter  which  he  then  recited.  The  apt 
ness  of  the  Latin  phraseology  was  irresistibly 
funny.  It  told  '  how  Yercingetorix  and  his  army, 
retreating  before  Caesar,  had  taken  refuge  on  a 
high,  rocky  hill,  strongly  fortified  and  precipitous 
on  every  side,  from  which  at  first  Caesar  had  de 
spaired  of  dislodging  him  without  a  long  siege. 
But  while  Caesar  was  considering  these  things  an 
opportunity  of  acting  successfully  seemed  to  offer. 
He  noticed  a  fissure  in  the  rock,  which  on  investi 
gation  by  night  was  discovered  to  pierce  the  hill 
from  side  to  side.  [Here  we  expected  the  ana 
chronism  of  dynamite  or  gunpowder.  But  no ; 
Lowell  more  justly  appreciated  the  natural  genius 
of  Caesar.]  Knowing  that  the  winter  was  now 
nigh  at  hand,  Caesar  ordered  two  legions  of  soldiers 


384  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

to  block  up  with  clay  and  twisted  willow  work  the 
opposite  ends  of  the  rocky  cleft,  and  then,  having 
filled  the  chasm  with  water,  to  await  the  issue. 
That  night  the  frost  came  ;  the  water  expanded ; 
the  high  rock  was  cleft  asunder ;  and  down  came 
Vercingetorix  and  his  army.  For  this  success  '  — 
Lowell  concluded  — '  a  supplication  of  twenty  days 
was  decreed  by  the  Senate  upon  receiving  Caesar's 
letter.'  " 

After  a  visit  to  St.  Ives,  Lowell  returned  to 
London  and  remained  there  till  the  middle  of  No 
vember.  His  friends  the  Misses  Lawrence  were 
at  Wildbad.  As  he  never  quite  finished  his  coup 
lets  to  Mrs.  Gilder,  so  he  never  quite  exhausted 
the  playful  names  he  gave  these  two  ladies.  "  O 
Giminy,"  he  wrote  from  London,  1  October  "  (for 
I  have  exhausted  all  other  ways  of  expressing  your 
twinship  in  my  affection,  and  any  opening  excla 
mation  will  suit  the  context),  O  Girniny,  I  say,  how 
can  you  be  happy  in  a  hotel  that  Klumpps  with  a 
double  p  like  a  man  with  a  club  foot,  and  in  a  town 
which,  by  its  own  confession,  is  both  wild  and  bad  ? 
What  are  you  doing  there  ?  Taking  the  baths  ? 
You  can't  soak  the  goodness  out  of  you,  if  you 
try  never  so  hard,  that 's  one  comfort.  You  '  ad 
mired  the  traces  of  the  Romans  at  Treves  '  did 
you  ?  Pray,  did  you  see  the  Holy  Coat  ?  That 
is  what  the  place  is  famous  for,  bless  your  innocent 
souls.  And  then  your  single  room  at  Munich  with 
4  2  or  3  Bismarcks,  as  many  Gladstones  and  Dol- 
lingers  '  in  it.  Do  you  expect  me  to  believe  that  ? 
It  would  have  been  uninhabitable  had  there  been 


THE   LAST   YEARS  385 

only  one  apiece  of  them,  and  you  know  it.  You 
trifle  with  my  understanding.  Smoky  London, 
indeed  !  The  sky  to-day  is  like  a  gigantic  blue 
bell  tipped  over  to  pour  out  the  sunshine  it  cannot 
contain.  And  the  town  is  emptily  delightful  and 
one  does  not  see  a  soul  one  knows  from  one  end  of 
the  week  to  t'  other.  I  shouldn't  mind  its  being 
fuller  by  a  dozen  or  so,  my  Ambidue  among  them. 
Indeed,  I  was  thinking  yesterday  of  writing  to  ask 
where  you  were  and  when  you  were  coming  back 
to  the  lovers  who  (all  but  one  of  them)  make  me 
so  jealous.  The  middle  of  October  seems  a  great 
way  off  to  that  single  inoffensive  one,  but  't  is 
better  than  nothing.  I  shall  be  here  till  the  mid 
dle  of  November,  and  you  will  let  me  know  the 
moment  you  come,  won't  you  ? 

"  I  have  n't  the  least  notion  where  Wildbad  is, 
and  you  give  no  geographical  details,  so  I  don't 
feel  sure  that  this  will  ever  reach  the  Hotel 
Klumpppppp  though  there  can't  be  two  of  that 
name  even  in  this  most  patient  of  worlds.  Did 
Wagner  ever  set  it  to  music  ?  Methinks  't  would 
have  suited  his  emphatic  and  somewhat  halting 
genius.  But  I  shall  try  for  a  guide-book,  and  if 
this  never  reaches  you,  I  shall  be  consoled  with 
thinking  that  you  will  never  know  how  little  you 
have  lost. 

"  I  am  very  well,  almost  as  well  as  before  my 
gout ;  but  I  am  rather  dull,  as  you  were  just  saying 
to  each  other.  However,  your  return  will  brighten 
me,  and  you  shall  take  me  to  the  play  and  the 
opera  and  Madame  Tussaud's  just  as  often  as  you 


386  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

please.  And  I  invite  myself  to  dine  with  you  too 
—  I  mean  two.  Am  I  not  generous?  The  nearer 
I  get  to  the  end  of  my  sheet  (like  a  prisoner  escap 
ing  and  doubtful  where  he  was  going  to  drop)  the 
more  I  wonder  where  Wildbad  is.  I  shall  ask  at 
a  foreign  book-shop.  That  is  the  simplest  plan, 
for  they  are  all  kept  by  German  Jews  who  know 
every  place  where  Christians  are  plundered  the 
world  over.  And  if  a  Bad  of  any  kind  does  not 
come  within  that  definition  I  am  greatly  mistaken. 
My  only  doubt  would  be  as  to  whether  you  were 
Christians  ?  Well,  you  have  always  treated  me  as 
if  you  were.  Good-by." 

Lowell  spent  a  night  at  Chester  with  Mr.  Hughes 
and  sailed  from  Liverpool  22  November.  He 
spent  the  winter  of  1888-1889  at  his  sister's,  Mrs. 
Putnam's,  in  Boston.  He  found  himself  physically 
depressed  and  disinclined  to  any  effort.  A  hasty 
acceptance  of  an  invitation  to  lecture  in  Philadel 
phia  brought  him  intolerable  discomfort,  and  he 
begged  to  be  let  off,  if  it  could  be  done  without 
prejudice  to  his  hosts.  "  It  is  absurd,"  he  wrote, 
"  but  I  was  made  so.  I  won't  torment  myself  by 
speaking  in  public  any  more.  With  any  such 
engagement  on  my  mind,  I  can  do  nothing  else, 
and  indeed  do  nothing  but  think  about  that."  Dr. 
Mitchell  at  once  released  him,  and  Lowell  wrote  in 
reply,  27  December,  1888 :  "  I  got  your  welcome 
letter  last  evening,  and  when  I  first  looked  in  the 
glass  this  morning  I  was  pleased  to  find  my  hair 
less  gray  than  when  I  went  to  bed.  You  never 
wrote  a  better  prescription.  My  mind  has  been 


THE  LAST  YEARS  387 

relieved  of  what  really  seemed  to  me  an  intolerable 
weight,  for,  whether  it  be  from  old  age  or  whatever 
cause,  I  have  been  undoubtedly  inert  both  in  body 
and  mind  since  my  attack  of  gout  last  summer." 
On  the  same  day  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Gilder :  "  Many 
thanks  for  your  welcome  home.  I  am  miserably 
dumpy,  thank  you,  with  the  remains  of  my  tedious 
fit  of  gout  last  summer,  which  continues  to  hold 
my  frontier  posts  as  the  British  did  ours  after  the 
treaty  of  1783.  But  I  hope  to  go  on  to  Washing 
ton  early  in  February  in  time  to  get  back  for  my 
seventieth  birthday,  which  I  can't  spend  in  the 
tents  of  Kedar." 

Lowell's  visit  to  Philadelphia  and  Washington 
is  pleasantly  reflected  in  his  letters.  His  son-in- 
law,  Mr.  Burnett,  was  at  that  time  a  member  of 
the  House  of  Representatives,  and  Lowell,  though 
he  expressed  a  fear  lest  his  lion's  mane  should  blow 
off,  was  entertained  agreeably  and  came  away  with 
an  admiration  for  many  of  the  public  men  he  met. 
His  seventieth  birthday  came  shortly  after  his 
return  to  Boston,  when  he  was  given  a  dinner  at 
the  Tavern  Club  over  which  Mr.  Norton  presided. 
"  I  was  listening  to  my  own  praises  for  two  hours 
last  night,"  he  wrote  to  Mrs.  Fields,  "  and  have 
hardly  got  used  to  the  discovery  of  how  great  a 
man  I  am."  He  heard  these  praises  again  in  a 
more  public  way  when  the  Critic  of  New  York 
made  its  number  for  23  February  a  "  Lowell  birth 
day  number,"  having  collected  warm  tributes  of 
affection  and  admiration  from  seventy  men  and 
women  of  note  in  America  and  England.  By  an 


388  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

ingenious  alphabetical  arrangement  the  editor  dis 
played  his  letters  from  Y  to  A,  the  astronomer 
Young  heading  the  list  and  the  poet  Aldrich  clos 
ing  it.  The  English  names  naturally  were  fewer 
in  number,  but  they  included  Tennyson  and  his  son, 
Gladstone,  Lord  Coleridge,  Lang,  Locker-Lamp- 
son,  and  Palgrave ;  amongst  his  own  countrymen 
were  those  yet  his  seniors,  Holmes,  Whittier,  Mrs. 
Stowe,  the  elder  Furness,  and  President  Barnard, 
while  the  poet  Parsons  born  in  the  same  year  and 
a  host  of  juniors  joined  in  the  chorus  of  loving 
praise.  As  Dr.  Horace  Howard  Furness  truly 
said :  "  It  is  no  small  tribute,  in  itself,  to  Mr. 
Lowell  that  we  should  all  be  thus  ready  to  praise 
him  to  his  face." 

Lowell  had  set  the  date  for  his  annual  pilgrim 
age  to  England  at  27  April,  but  a  pressing  invita 
tion  to  speak  on  the  30th  of  that  month  at  the 
great  celebration  in  New  York  of  the  hundredth 
anniversary  of  Washington's  inauguration  as  first 
president,  which  he  tried  in  vain  to  decline,  com 
pelled  him  to  postpone  his  departure  for  nearly  a 
month.  Meanwhile  he  worked  somewhat  fitfully 
at  literature,  belabored  as  he  was  with  letters  and 
social  distractions.  Mr.  Aldrich  asked  him  to 
write  for  the  Atlantic  a  paper  on  John  Bright, 
who  had  just  died.  At  first  he  thought  he  could 
write  it,  but  a  fortnight  later  he  wrote  :  "  There 
is  no  use  in  trying.  Cold  molasses  is  swift  as  a 
weaver's  shuttle  compared  with  my  wits.  I  have 
essayed  every  side  of  the  subject  like  a  beetle  in  a 
tumbler  and  find  myself  on  my  back  after  each 


THE   LAST   YEARS  389 

attempt.  So  you  must  let  me  give  it  up."  It  was 
characteristic  of  his  unfailing  interest  in  all  genu 
ine  literature,  new  or  old,  that  he  should  at  the 
same  time  have  written  to  Mr.  Aldrich  his  pleasure 
in  a  poem,  "  Deaths  in  April,"  in  the  current  At 
lantic.  "  Too  intricate  and  even  obscure  I  thought 
it  here  and  there,  but  perhaps  the  intricacy  is  of 
forest-boughs  and  the  obscurity  nothing  more  than 
the  gloom  which  they  teach  light  to  counterfeit. 
Never  mind,  't  is  the  Muses'  utterance."  * 

The  special  piece  of  writing  which  did  occupy 
him  for  awhile,  an  introduction  to  Isaak  Walton's 
"  Complete  Angler,"  may  fairly  be  called  one  of 
the  happiest  of  his  literary  appreciations.  He 
writes,  to  be  sure,  to  Dr.  Mitchell  that  he  is  "  thor 
oughly  fagged  "  with  the  work,  but  to  the  unsus 
pecting  reader  who  comes  upon  it  in  the  volume  of 
Lowell's  "  Latest  Literary  Essays  and  Addresses  " 
there  is  the  sense  only  of  a  quieter  tone  than  he 
finds  in  the  Gray,  for  example,  in  the  same  vol 
ume.  There  is  no  lack  of  acuteness,  rather  one  is 
struck  with  the  delicacy  of  the  criticism,  but  the 
special  charm  is  in  the  delight  which  Lowell  takes 
in  his  sunny-tempered  author.  It  is  as  if  he  had 
been  thoroughly  fagged  when  he  took  Walton 
down  and  as  he  read  the  "  Lives  "  and  the  "  Com 
plete  Angler  "  was  drawn  within  the  cheerful  mind 
of  Walton  and  warmed  himself  at  the  open  fire  of 
his  charity.  The  paper  has  the  value  one  finds  so 
often  in  Lowell's  writings,  of  reflecting  the  writer's 
mood,  and  one  who  has  followed  Lowell  into  the 

1  The  poem  was  by  Mr.  Bliss  Carman. 


390  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

recesses  of  his  consciousness  of  age  can  scarcely 
fail  to  bear  him  company  when  he  finds  him  writ 
ing  of  Walton :  "  But  what  justifies  and  ennobles 
these  lower  loves  (of  music,  painting,  good  ale,  and 
a  pipe),  what  gives  him  a  special  and  native  aroma 
like  that  of  Alexander,  is  that  above  all  he  loved 
the  beauty  of  holiness  and  those  ways  of  taking 
and  of  spending  life  that  make  it  wholesome  for 
ourselves  and  our  fellows.  His  view  of  the  world 
is  not  of  the  widest,  but  it  is  the  Delectable  Moun 
tains  that  bound  the  prospect.  Never  surely  was 
there  a  more  lovable  man,  nor  one  to  whom  love 
found  access  by  more  avenues  of  sympathy." 

The  after-dinner  speech  for  which  Lowell  con 
sented  to  postpone  his  summer  journey  to  England 
was  in  response  to  the  toast  "  Our  Literature." 
The  speech  appears  as  the  last  piece  of  literature 
which  Lowell  published  in  his  collected  writings, 
and  it  is  a  coincidence  that  this  should  stand  at  the 
end  of  his  career,  when  at  the  beginning,  if  we 
may,  not  unnaturally,  count  The  Pioneer  as  his 
formal  bow  in  the  profession  of  letters,  stood  the 
announcement  of  his  outlook  on  national  literature. 
Nearly  forty-seven  years  lie  between  the  two  de 
liverances.  As  a  young  man  of  twenty-three  he 
scouted  the  idea  of  an  artificial  division  between 
the  literature  of  America  and  that  of  England,  he 
deprecated  the  too  close  dependence  upon  the  cur 
rent  judgments  of  English  writers  for  the  press, 
and  he  pleaded  eagerly  for  a  natural  literature  in 
America,  the  free  reflection  of  a  free  people.  Now, 
with  the  reflection  of  age  he  considers  in  his  brief 


THE  LAST  YEAKS  391 

space  those  fundamental  principles  which  make  for 
the  endurance  of  a  national  literature,  —  the  right 
sense  of  proportion  between  things  material  and 
things  spiritual,  the  necessity  of  inviolable  stand 
ards,  the  dependence  upon  the  whole  literature  of 
the  world.  His  last  word  is  a  word  of  hope,  as 
was  befitting  a  prophet  of  literature,  standing  at 
the  end  of  the  first  century  of  a  nation's  life,  as 
years  are  measured  from  the  consciousness  of  ex 
istence. 

"  The  literature  of  a  people  should  be  the  record 
of  its  joys  and  sorrows,  its  aspirations  and  its 
shortcomings,  its  wisdom  and  its  folly,  the  con 
fidant  of  its  soul.  We  cannot  say  that  our  own  as 
yet  suffices  us,  but  I  believe  that  he  who  stands  a 
hundred  years  hence  where  I  am  standing  now, 
conscious  that  he  speaks  to  the  most  powerful  and 
prosperous  community  ever  devised  or  developed 
by  man,  will  speak  of  our  literature  with  the  assur 
ance  of  one  who  beholds  what  we  hope  for  and 
aspire  after  become  a  reality  and  a  possession  for- 


Lowell  sailed  for  England  18  May,  1889,  and 
spent  five  months  there  at  his  customary  haunts  in 
London  and  in  Whitby,  revisiting  his  old  friends 
and  preferring  the  intimate  associations  to  the  social 
functions.  uYou  ask  me  so  many  things,"  he 
writes  to  Mrs.  Clifford  from  Radnor  Place,  17  June, 
"  in  such  a  breathless  way  —  all  of  them  disparate, 
and  some  of  them  desperate  —  that  I  know  not 
which  way  to  turn.  Besides,  have  n't  you  con- 


392  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

fessed  that  you  set  springes  in  your  notes?  And 
how  can  I  tell  but  that  every  ?  is  a  springe  (they 
look  like  it),  and  that  I  may  not  find  myself  dan 
gling  like  an  unwary  hare  with  no  chance  ever  to 
put  my  foot  into  anything  again  ?  However,  I 
will  tread  cautiously  and  give  each  of  'em  a  little 
preliminary  shake  to  see  if  there  be  any  mischief 
in  'em. 

"  1st.  Will  I  come  to  tea  Thursday?  I  turn  it 
over  gingerly  —  it  lies  quite  still  and  does  n't  seem 
likely  to  go  off  with  a  jerk.  I  think  it  harmless 
and  answer  '  yes.'  I  don't  like  the  artist  being 
there  with  her  pictures,  for  that  may  incur  me  the 
expense  of  several  fibs,  and  I  am  not  sure  how 
many  I  have  left. 

"2d.  Do  I  know  Miss  ?  This  looks  more 

suspicious  and  I  give  it  a  wide  berth. 

"  3d.  Have  I  read  '  A  Conversation  in  a  Bal 
cony  '  ?  Here  I  seem  safe  enough  because  I  have  n't. 
So  I  reply  boldly,  '  I  have  sent  for  it  and  will 
read  it.' 

"  4th.  Will  I  take  your  head  off  ?  This  is  a  spe 
cific  proposition  and  therefore  less  likely  to  have  any 
dolus  hidden  in  it,  and  you  offer  me  a  prodigious 
bribe.  But  no,  I  won't !  I  have  a  better  opinion 
of  your  top-piece  than  you  have  (for  the  moment), 
and  think  it  more  useful  and  becoming  where  it  is. 
Moreover,  there  was  never  head  heard  of  that 
looked  well  after  it  was  off  except  Charlotte  Cor- 
day's,  and  this  is  worth  your  consideration,  and  I 
am  sure  (since  you  are  a  woman)  will  have  it.  So 
we  will  wait.  But  I  will  come  Thursday." 


THE  LAST  YEARS  393 

There  is  a  playfulness  about  all  Lowell's  letters 
during  this  last  summer  he  was  to  spend  in  Eng 
land,  a  pleasure  in  little  things,  as  in  his  walks 
and  encounters,  and  a  deep  draught  of  delight  in 
the  sea.  His  month  at  Whitby  lengthened  to  six 
weeks,  and  he  was  reluctant  to  leave  this  secluded 
corner.  Here  he  read  Dante  and  Milton,  Lope  de 
Vega  and  Calderon,  Byron,  and  some  old  French 
texts.  He  felt  uncommonly  well,  and  he  even 
wrote  a  poem,  "  The  Brook,"  for  which  the  New 
York  Ledger  had  offered  a  generous  sum. 

When  Lowell  returned  to  America  he  went  back 
to  Elmwood.  Mrs.  Burnett  had  arranged  to  re 
turn  with  her  children  and  make  a  home  there  for 
her  father,  and  it  was  with  a  long  sigh  of  content 
that  he  settled  himself  in  a  place  which  was  en 
deared  to  him  by  lifelong  attachment.  Yet  it  was 
with  some  discomposure  that  he  looked  upon  the 
changes  going  on  in  the  neighborhood.  The  vil 
lage  of  Cambridge  had  long  ago  become  a  city, 
though  still  retaining  a  lingering  village  air,  but 
now  houses  were  creeping  toward  the  confines  of 
the  town  and  filling  those  great  empty  spaces 
which  had  given  him  the  sense  of  delightful  roomi 
ness.  He  was  a  genuine  conservative  as  regards 
places,  and  no  doubt  his  English  residence  had 
confirmed  his  conviction  that  it  was  well  to  strike 
root  deeply  in  planting  the  family,  which  is  the 
greatest  conservative  force.  A  few  years  before, 
when  he  was  minister  to  England,  I  brought  him 
news  of  the  neighborhood,  and  his  brow  clouded 
as  I  reported  the  rumor  that  more  horse-car  tracks 


394  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

were  to  be  laid  near  Elmwood.  "  I  never,  never 
will  go  back  there  to  live,"  he  declared  vehemently, 
"if  they  make  these  inroads  on  my  place."  He 
had  been  forced  to  reduce  the  area  of  the  estate  as 
it  was  in  his  father's  day  and  his  youth,  but  he  was 
jealous  of  any  further  encroachment  on  the  integ 
rity  of  his  little  patch  of  land,  and  in  a  world  of 
change  about  him  clung  tenaciously  to  his  foot 
hold. 

During  the  winter  of  1889-1890  Lowell  occupied 
himself  with  preparing  a  uniform  edition  of  his 
writings,  and  answered  one  or  two  of  the  applica 
tions  he  had  for  poems  or  papers.  His  own  needs 
were  few,  he  lived  simply,  and  he  was  under  no 
stress  of  necessity,  but  he  was  eager  to  turn  over 
with  increment  the  little  estate  he  had  to  his 
daughter  and  her  children.  Mr.  Howells  had  in 
terested  himself  in  procuring  a  poem  from  Lowell 
for  Harper's  Monthly,  for  which  a  liberal  sum  was 
paid,  and  Lowell,  when  the  transaction  was  over, 
wrote  him  :  "  I  happened  to  want  the  money,  and 
though  one  cannot  write  a  poem  for  money,  one  is 
glad  to  get  what  one  can  for  it  once  written.  You 
partly  know  how  it  is  with  me.  My  heart's  desire 
is  to  leave  Mabel  as  independent  as  I  can,  and 
what  I  leave  will,  at  best,  hardly  go  round  among 
so  many.  Now  I  had  got  myself  into  a  place 
where  I  could  not  keep  certain  promises  I  had 
made  without  encroaching  on  my  principal.  Your 
benefice  will  just  tide  me  over.  The  sacredness  of 
my  little  pile  has  become  almost  a  cult  with  me." 


The  Hall  at  Elmivood 


396  JAMES    RUSSELL  LOWELL 

gested  it.  It  is  enough.  Let  them  go  hang !  — 
both  dates  and  bucaneers.  And  my  Lord  Chief 
Justice  Holt  (was  n't  it  he  who  first  made  the 
unrighteous  distinction  between  the  property  of 
authors  and  that  of  their  worsers  ?),  let  him  swing 
amidst  of  'em !  This  settles  the  Appendix." 

Lowell  loved  the  minutiae  of  verbal  criticism. 
It  was  part  of  his  jealousy  for  the  purity  of  the 
language,  and  meant  that  touch  which  the  artist 
gives.  Slovenliness  was  his  abhorrence,  and  free 
as  he  was  with  the  vernacular,  he  made  a  clear  dis 
tinction  between  the  undress  and  the  dress  occa 
sions  of  speech.  I  transmitted  to  him  at  this  time 
a  criticism  which  took  him  to  task  for  the  use  of 
the  form  "  try  and."  He  replied :  "  I  am  much 

obliged  to  Mr.  for  his  friendly  interest  in  my 

English.  The  phrase  '  try  and,'  like  '  come  and,'  is 
to  some  extent  conversational,  but  it  is  idiomatic. 
There  is  plenty  of  authority  for  it.  Here  is  one 
from  Thackeray,  who  uses  it  often  :  — 

"  '  Don't  they  try  and  pass  off  their  ordinary- 
looking  girls  ?  &c.' l 

"  You  will  observe  that  in  the  passage  criticised 
by  Mr.  -  -  I  am  supposing  another  person  to 
speak,  and  therefore  made  it  purposely  familiar. 
'  Come  and '  occurs  in  the  first  motto  of  the  Bay 
Colony :  '  Come  over  and  help  us '  —  from  the 
Bible,  '  Come  over  into  Macedonia,  and  help  us.' 
Matthew  Arnold  uses  it,  and  I  think  it  is  in  Shake 
speare  also." 

In  the  spring  of  1890  Lowell  suffered  from  what 

1  "  Small-Beer  Chronicle,"  in  Roundabout  Papers. 


THE  LAST  YEARS  397 

he  called  "  the  first  severe  illness  of  my  life."  It 
proved  indeed  to  be  the  beginning  of  the  end.  For 
six  weeks  he  kept  his  bed,  and  when  he  was  able 
at  last  to  crawl  about,  his  physician  forbade  even 
the  briefest  journey.  He  had  been  asked  to  give 
an  address  in  Vermont,  and  he  was  obliged  to 
write  :  "  I  arn  not  yet  allowed  even  to  drive  out  or 
to  use  my  legs  except  in  loitering  about  my  own 
grounds.  So  you  see  that  Castleton  is  as  impossi 
ble  to  me  as  Mecca.  .  .  .  Let  me  add  that  I  have 
a  special  partiality  for  Vermont  as  the  New  Eng 
land  State  which  maintains  most  persistently  our 
best  traditions." 

To  Mr.  Godkin  he  wrote,  29  April :  "  I  have 
had  rather  a  hard  time  of  it,  and  for  a  day  or  two 
Wyman  had  fears.  The  acute  symptoms  ceased  a 
month  ago,  and  I  am  now  doing  well,  but  my  mal 
ady  has  somewhat  demoralized  me  and  I  must  con 
sent  to  be  an  invalid  for  a  good  while  yet.  'T  is 
my  first  experience  and  I  don't  like  it.  Moralists 
tell  us  that  pain  is  for  our  good,  but  even  the  gout 
has  failed  to  make  me  think  so,  and  this  was  even 
harder  to  bear."  But  he  had  been  amusing  him 
self  with  some  verses  on  "  infant  industries  "  which 
he  sent  in  this  letter,  giving  them  the  title,  "  The 
New  Septimius  Felton."  They  were  printed  in  the 
Nation  with  the  title,  "  The  Infant  Prodigy." 

On  the  second  of  May  he  wrote  from  Elmwood 
to  Mr.  Gilder,  who  was  to  give  the  poem  that  year 
before  3>.  B.  K.  in  Cambridge  :  "  You  may  be  sure 
that  I  shall  support  you  with  my  sympathetic  pre 
sence  at  <I>.  B.  K.  if  my  legs  will  by  that  time  sup- 


398  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

port  me,  as  I  have  now  every  reason  to  think  they 
will.  I  made  an  excursion  to  Cambridge  (by 
horse-car)  yesterday,  my  first  adventure  of  the  kind 
for  fourteen  weeks,  and  am  none  the  worse  for  it." 

Of  course  a  summer  in  England  was  out  of 
the  question,  and  Mr.  Leslie  Stephen,  one  of  the 
friends  who  made  so  large  a  part  of  an  English 
summer  to  Lowell,  came  instead  to  America  to  see 
Lowell  once  more  in  his  home.  There  he  found 
him  amongst  his  books  and  with  the  squirrels 
gambolling  outside,  but  the  days  of  long  walks 
were  over,  and  even  the  social  pleasures  which 
Lowell  could  share  with  his  guest  were  few  and 
simple. 

He  saw  the  completion  of  the  revision  of  his 
writings,  and  the  ten  comely  volumes  standing  all 
a-row  were  a  fair  evidence  to  him  that  he  was  not 
so  indolent  as  he  was  wont  to  call  himself.  His 
malady  left  him  little  power  for  any  continuous 
work,  but  he  wrote  the  introduction  to  a  reprint  of 
the  first  edition  of  Milton's  "  Areopagitica,"  a  brief 
paper  on  Parkman  for  the  Century  Magazine,  and 
a  trifle  for  the  Contributors'  Club  in  the  Atlantic 
Monthly.  It  may  be  that  he  glanced  at  the  six 
volumes  of  his  own  prose  when  he  wrote  of  Mil 
ton:  "He  must  have  known,  if  any  ever  knew, 
that  even  in  the  '  sermo  pedestris '  there  are  yet 
great  differences  in  gait,  that  prose  is  governed  by 
laws  of  modulation  as  exact,  if  not  so  exacting,  as 
those  of  verse,  and  that  it  may  conjure  with  words 
as  prevailingly.  The  music  is  secreted  in  it,  yet 
often  more  potent  in  suggestion  than  that  of  any 


THE   LAST  YEARS  399 

verse  which  is  not  of  utmost  mastery."  And  then 
follows  a  brief  sentence  which  has  in  it  the  very 
charm  he  is  praising.  "  We  hearken  after  it  as  to 
a  choir  in  the  side  chapel  of  some  cathedral  heard 
/aintly  and  fitfully  across  the  long  desert  of  the 
nave,  now  pursuing  and  overtaking  the  cadences, 
only  to  have  them  grow  doubtful  again  and  elude 
the  ear  before  it  has  ceased  to  throb  with  them." 

It  was  characteristic  of  him  that  he  should  write 
to  Mr.  Gilder :  "  .  .  .  Now  what  I  wish  to  know 
is,  how  soon  do  you  want  the  Parkman  ?  I  have 
just  had  an  offer  of  a  thousand  dollars  for  a  short 
paper  of  reminiscences,  and  I  think  I  might  make 
something  that  would  at  least  c/o,  out  of  my  boy 
hood.  I  want  the  money  —  I  always  do,  more  '3 
the  pity,  but  I  want  it  particularly  just  now  that  I 
may  help  a  friend  who  is  in  straits.  May  I  write 
this  first  ?  The  Parkman  is  more  than  half  done, 
and  all  thought  out."  Plenty  of  money  lay  within 
Lowell's  grasp  if  he  would  sell  his  name  and  a  few 
hours  of  work,  but  he  never  had  been  able  to  make 
merchandise  of  his  art,  and  it  cost  him  an  effort, 
when  he  was  asked  to  name  a  price,  to  cast  his 
name  into  the  balance.  His  publishers,  finding 
him  putting  off  the  volume  on  Hawthorne,  held 
out  the  promise  of  a  very  liberal  payment  as  soon 
as  they  could  have  the  book,  but  he  did  not  get 
beyond  the  preliminary  business  of  re-reading 
his  author.  Yet  the  needs  of  a  friend  offered  the 
requisite  stimulus. 

The  article  in  the  Contributors'  Club  was  a  hu 
morous  defence  of  certain  American  locutions  and 


400  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

forms  of  spelling  against  half-learned  objections. 
It  was  a  return  to  a  favorite  theme  and  contains 
an  amusing  sketch  of  a  proof-reader  whom  we  take 
to  be  his  old  friend  Mr.  George  Nichols.  The  club 
is  in  a  vein  which  naturally  assumes  a  half  antique 
manner,  and  the  treatment  shows  that  smiling  ac 
ceptance  of  the  prejudices  of  learning  which  is  the 
scholar's  defence  against  the  logic  of  the  pedant. 
Even  this  trifle,  unsigned,  and  inconspicuous  in 
its  setting,  could  not  get  printed  finally  without 
two  or  three  hurried  notes  from  its  author,  amend 
ing  and  adding  to  it,  and  the  last  proofs  were  re 
turned  with  a  sigh :  "  I  thought  the  thing  livelier 
than  I  find  it  —  it  kicked  so  lustily  in  the  womb. 
But  nothing  is  good  after  't  is  born  !  " 

If  Lowell  was  growing  old,  so  also  were  others 
with  whom  he  had  had  lifelong  associations.  Whit- 
tier  was  twelve  years  his  senior,  and  though  all  his 
life  an  invalid,  never  lost  his  singing  voice,  and 
Lowell  wrote  him,  16  December,  1890 :  — 

DEAR  FRIEND  WHITTIER,  —  I  had  meant  to 
write  you  a  word  of  thanks  for  your  "  Captain's 
Well "  [in  the  New  York  Ledger'],  but  that  with 
some  other  good  intentions  was  hindered  of  fruition 
by  my  illness.  It  seemed  to  me  in  your  happiest 
vein  —  a  vein  peculiarly  your  own.  Tears  came 
into  my  eyes  as  I  read  it. 

Since  I  could  not  write  then,  I  do  it  now  to 
wish  you  and  all  of  us  many  happy  returns  of 
your  birthday.  It  is  partly  a  selfish  wish,  for  the 
world  will  seem  a  worse  world  to  me  when  you 


THE   LAST  YEARS  401 

have  left  it,  but  it  is  not  wholly  so.     The  universal 
love  and  honor  which  attend  you,  and  in  which  I 
heartily  join,  are  of  excellent  example,  and  it  is 
well  that  you  should  live  long  to  enjoy  them. 
Faithfully  yours, 

J.  R.  LOWELL. 

Dedications,  those  shy  birds,  came  fluttering 
about  Lowell  in  these  days.  One  was  in  an  anony 
mous  volume  of  verse  from  a  friend  dear  for  her 
own  sake  and  her  mother's.  It  had  come  to  him 
in  manuscript  first  and  then  revised.  When  it 
came  first,  he  wrote :  "  I  am  perfectly  satisfied 
with  the  dedication  —  how  should  I  not  be  ?  But 
how,  in  any  case,  could  I  look  such  a  gift  horse  in 
the  mouth?  I  should  like  it  quand  meme  as  a 
proof  of  your  affection,  for  that  is  the  main  thing ; 
4  Only,  only  call  me  dear ! '  "  and  two  days  later, 
when  an  alternate  form  came  :  "  Yes,  I  like  this 
better.  I  could  not  have  discussed  what  you 
should  say  in  such  a  case,  but  you  have  shown 
your  woman's  wit  (as  I  thought  you  would)  in 
divining  what  I  stole  from  Coleridge  and  he  from 
Lessing." 

Dr.  Weir  Mitchell  inscribed  to  him  his  volume 
"  A  Psalm  of  Death  and  other  Poems,"  and  Low 
ell  acknowledged  the  honor  :  "  I  am  very  proud  of 
my  book.  You  know  how  in  the  tray  for  visiting 
cards  those  of  the  more  socially  distinguished  drift 
to  the  top  (by  a  kind  of  natural  selection)  where 
they  may  be  better  seen  of  such,  and  so  your  vol 
ume  lies  conspicuously  on  my  table  by  some  happy 


402  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

chance,  that  everybody  who  comes  to  see  me  is 
sure  also  to  pick  it  up  and  look  at  it.  I  read  it 
through  as  soon  as  I  got  it  and  with  entire  satis 
faction.  Without  partiality  I  like  it  better  than 
any  of  its  predecessors,  and  I  have  told  you  how 
much  I  like  them.  Your  touch,  I  think,  is  more 
assured,  and  the  slag  more  thoroughly  worked  out 
of  the  ore.  I  shan't  tell  you  which  I  like  best  any 
more  than  I  should  think  of  showing  any  prefer 
ence  among  my  grandchildren,  though  I  am  con 
scious  that  I  obscurely  feel  something  of  the  kind. 
Without  indelicacy,  however,  I  may  mention  a  fa 
vorite  passage.  It  occurs  on  the  leaf  following  the 
title-page,  and  seemed  to  me  every  way  admirable. 
It  will  be  a  treasure  to  me  so  long  as  I  live.  I 
have  had  no  sharp  attack  since  the  middle  of  No 
vember,  but  for  the  last  three  weeks  have  been  in 
so  wretched  a  valetudinarian  way  that  Mabel  has 
called  in  Wyman  again.  I  am  beginning  to  think 
't  is  Old  Age  after  all.  I  fancy  I  know  how  a 
bear  feels  during  hibernation  when  he  is  getting 
near  the  end  of  his  fast." 

A  fortnight  after  this  Lowell  wrote  again  of  him 
self,  to  his  friends  the  Misses  Lawrence :  "  I  ought 
to  have  written  long  ago  to  thank  you  for  your 
dear  remembrance  of  me  at  Christmas.  It  was  not 
ingratitude  but  sheer  unconsciousness  of  the  goings 
on  of  Time.  I  have  been  a  wretched  valetudi 
narian,  and  the  days  dribble  away  from  me  ere  I 
am  aware.  I  don't  mean  that  I  have  been  seri 
ously  ill  again ;  but  I  don't  get  strong  and  seem  in 
a  lethargy  half  the  time.  However,  I  still  reckon 


THE  LAST  YEARS  403 

on  the  approaching  visit  of  Doctor  Spring,  whose 
prescriptions  have  always  done  me  good.  They  are 
simple  enough,  —  birds  and  bees  and  things,  —  but 
they  do  wonders  for  me.  My  great  bother  now  is 
that  the  least  exertion  tires  me.  Yet  I  believe  I 
am  as  happy  as  most  men.  At  any  rate,  I  have 
had  my  share.  You  have  been  a  part  of  it,  and  I 
have  you  still,  thanks  to  your  persistent  kindness. 

"  We  have  had  a  better  winter  than  you  (thanks 
to  our  admirable  form  of  government),  but  more 
snow  than  for  several  years.  This  has  made  the 
roads  merry  with  sleighs.  I  myself  have  been  out 
in  a  sleigh  two  or  three  times  and  enjoyed  it  in  a 
quiet  way.  To-day  it  is  raining  and  eating  away 
the  snow  very  fast.  .  .  .  Spite  of  your  crusty 
winter  I  should  have  been  glad  to  share  it  with 
you.  I  am  so  true  a  lover  that  I  love  my  London 
even  in  the  sulks.  'T  is  the  best  place  for  dwelling 
in  the  world  except  this  house  where  I  was  born." 

Not  long  after  Lowell  began  his  work  at  Har 
vard,  he  came  into  his  class-room  one  day,  and 
before  giving  his  regular  lecture,  spoke  to  his  stu 
dents  a  few  pointed  words  regarding  Dr.  Henry 
Ware  Wales,  who  had  recently  died,  and  whose 
name  is  perpetuated  in  the  University  by  the 
books  he  gave  and  by  the  Sanscrit  professorship 
which  he  founded.  Dr.  Wales  had  been  his  friend 
from  boyhood,  and  Lowell  spoke  kindly  and  touch- 
ingly  of  his  amiability  and  generosity ;  but  then  he 
passed  to  a  graver  theme  suggested  by  the  superb 
courage  with  which  his  friend  faced  Death.  As 
one  reads  these  passages  in  connection  with  Low- 


404  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

ell's  own  final  experience,  one  cannot  fail  to  hear 
almost  a  prophetic  voice.  Little  stress  has  been 
laid  in  these  pages  on  the  keen  suffering  which 
marked  the  closing  months  of  Lowell's  life,  but 
suffering  there  was,  almost  unbearable.  Above 
this  physical  pain,  however,  rose  the  courageous 
spirit  which  does  not  lose  itself  in  vain  murmur- 
ings.  Something  of  his  cheerful  encounter  with 
death  appears  in  his  letters,  and  he  made  light  to 
his  friends  of  his  pain  ;  but  the  physicians  who 
attended  him  knew  through  what  he  was  passing.1 
Hear  then  how  he  spoke  of  Dr.  Wales  thirty-five 
years  earlier,  when  he  himself  was  in  full  vigor. 

"  I  saw  him  frequently  in  Rome  a  few  months 
before  his  death,  and  I  can  speak  from  my  own 
knowledge.  Just  before  coming  to  Rome,  I  had 
been  reading  over  the  Philoctetes  of  Sophocles, 
little  thinking  that  I  was  so  soon  to  find  the  story 
of  that  hero  acted  over  again  under  my  eyes  by  a 
coeval  and  friend.  Like  Philoctetes,  his  grievous 
wound  was  in  a  single  limb,  or  rather  in  a  single 
joint  —  and  yet  there  he  lay,  otherwise  a  strong 
man,  utterly  helpless,  and  hopeful  only  of  that 
release  which  comes  to  all.  His  island  of  Lemnos 
was  the  bed  from  which  he  could  not  rise.  He 
was  perfectly  aware  of  his  situation.  He  had 
studied  medicine,  and  knew  that  his  death  warrant 
was  signed.  And  here  it  was  that  he  showed  a 

1  An  examination  made  after  Lowell's  death  showed  that  the 
bleeding  with  which  the  sickness  began  eighteen  months  or  more 
previously  was  the  first  step  in  the  course  of  the  growth  of  a 
cancer  of  the  kidney.  The  disease  had  extended  to  the  liver,  and 
at  the  last  to  the  lungs. 


THE   LAST  YEARS  405 

courage  and  a  firmness  which  were  truly  heroic. 
He  told  me  that  he  had  no  hope,  that  he  saw  death 
approaching,  and  I  shall  never  forget  the  expres 
sion  of  his  face  as  he  said  it.  He  looked  into  the 
distance  as  if  he  literally  saw  the  messenger  of  his 
doom,  and  measured  him  with  a  fearless  and  un- 
quailing  eye,  as  a  braver  man  measures  an  antago 
nist.  He  spoke  alike  without  levity  and  without 
selfish  sentimentality.  He  did  not  wish  to  die,  nor 
did  he  pretend  it,  but  like  a  true  man  he  fronted 
Death  like  an  equal,  advanced  to  meet  him  cheer 
fully,  and  did  not  wait  to  be  dragged  to  his  door 
like  a  culprit.  I  have  stood  on  many  battlefields, 
but  here  I  was  present  at  the  battle  itself.  I  saw 
what  the  ancients  declared  the  noblest  prospect  for 
human  eyes,  —  at  once  the  noblest  and  most  tragic, 
—  a  brave  man  meeting  Fate.  For  it  was  Fate,  — 
the  wound  was  apparently  a  trifling  one,  but  the 
arrow  was  poisoned.  There  was  no  escape. 

"  Rome  was  at  its  gayest,  and  he  knew  it.  The 
great  Easter  throng  was  gathered  before  St. 
Peter's  to  receive  the  blessing  of  him  whom  his 
subjects  curse.  The  great  dome  shone  with  that 
illumination  so  beautiful  that  one  might  almost 
rank  it  as  a  new  constellation  suddenly  created 
upon  the  purple  evening  sky  of  Italy.  And  all  the 
while  he  lay  there  chained  —  suffering  pains  which 
no  opiate  could  entirely  deaden  —  and  uttered  no 
complaint,  nay,  was  cheerful.  And  now  it  was  that 
his  studies  stood  him  in  good  stead.  As  he  had 
been  faithful  to  virtue  and  honorable  aims,  so  were 
they  now  not  unfaithful  to  him.  He  felt  the  truth 


406  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL 

upon  his  sleepless  pillow  of  Cicero's  pernoctant 
nobis.  Those  invisible  visitants  that  thronged  his 
chamber  came  not  with  faces  of  reproach,  but  with 
countenances  of  hope  and  consolation,  on  which 
truly  the  light  of  Easter  morning,  of  the  Resurrec 
tion,  was  shining. 

"  It  is  proverbial  that  all  men  die  game.  But  it 
was  not  the  mere  act  of  dying  which  tried  his  cour 
age  and  serenity.  It  was  the  lying  in  prison  under 
sentence  of  Death,  and  it  was  the  prison  of  the  In 
quisition,  too,  where  he  was  hourly  tortured. 

"  It  is  not,  then,  as  our  benefactor,  it  is  not  as 
my  schoolmate,  classmate,  and  the  friend  of  nearly 
twenty-five  years,  it  is  not  merely  as  the  scholar, 
that  I  feel  impelled  to  commemorate  him  here.  It 
is  as  an  example  of  how  refined  studies  refine  and 
elevate  the  character,  how  they  give  a  vantage 
ground  impregnable  to  chance  and  pain  and  death  ; 
it  is  as  the  heroic  man,  quietly  and  without  hope 
of  fame  or  credit,  fighting  the  good  fight  in  that 
single  combat  in  which  any  one  of  us  at  any  time 
may  be  compelled  to  take  up  the  gauntlet  of  that 
foe  who  fights  with  enchanted  weapons,  against 
which  there  is  no  hope. 

"  He  is  now  dead  and  nailed  in  his  chest. 
I  pray  to  God  to  give  his  soul  good  rest." 

The  spring  of  1891  came  and  Lowell  had  cheer 
ful  hope  of  further  work.  He  had  not  dismissed 
literature  because  he  had  collected  his  writings  into 
a  series  of  books.  He  meant  to  write  more,  to  bring 
together  more  scattered  papers  for  a  volume  and  to 


THE  LAST  YEARS  407 

make  at  least  one  more  collection  of  his  poems. 
Meanwhile  he  read  —  his  books  were  close  at  hand 
and  his  constant  friends.  He  re-read  Bos  well's 
Johnson  for  the  fourth  time,  and  he  read  the  re 
cently  published  full  diary  of  Walter  Scott.  He 
took  up  novel  reading,  rather  a  new  taste,  and 
amused  himself  with  contemporaneous  society  in 
England  as  depicted  by  Norris.  At  Mr.  Bartlett's 
suggestion,  the  whist  club  to  which  he  had  been  so 
faithful  held  one  more  meeting  which  he  made 
out  to  attend.  But  though  he  could  go  out  but 
little,  he  had  a  pleasant  glimpse  of  the  world 
that  lay  about  his  house,  —  the  earliest  and  the 
best  known  world  to  him.  He  had  had  a  flat  dish 
with  stones  in  it  conveniently  placed  in  his  garden, 
and  connected  it  with  his  water  pipe  so  that  his 
little  friends  the  thrushes,  the  orioles,  and  squirrels 
might  have  free  use  of  the  modern  improvements 
to  which  he  was  indifferent  enough.1  Outside  of 
his  bedroom  window  a  pair  of  gray  squirrels  had 
nested,  and  as  he  was  imprisoned  there  by  the  ill 
ness  which  now  closed  in  about  him,  he  looked 
with  kindly  interest  on  their  gambols  in  the  tree- 
tops.  His  friends  came  as  he  could  see  them,  and 
he  entertained  them  with  humorous  diatribes  on  his 
gaoler  gout.  Now  and  then  he  could  pencil  a  letter 
or  note,  sending  a  message  perhaps  to  some  equally 
bound  sufferer,  as  when  he  commiserated  his  old 
friend  Judge  Hoar,  shut  up  with  an  attack  of  in 
flammatory  rheumatism,  and  whimsically  cautioned 

1  See  an  interesting  note  by  W.  J.  Stillman  in  the  Spectator, 
1  July,  1899. 


408  JAMES   RUSSELL  LOWELL 

him  against  mistaking  it  for  the  gout  which  he  him 
self  was  enduring.  A  faint  smile  plays  about  these 
last  expressions  of  his  kindly  nature,  as  he  seems 
to  wave  the  world  aside  that  he  may  take  his 
friends  by  the  hand.  Death  found  him  cheerful, 
and  he  passed  away  in  the  middle  of  the  bright 
summer. 


APPENDIX 
A.   THE  LOWELL  ANCESTRY 

I.  Paternal?- 

1.  THE  first  American  ancestor  of  the  Massachusetts 
Lowells  was  PERCEVAL  LOWELL,  written  also  LOWLE, 
who  came  from  Somersetshire,  England,  in  1639,  when 
he  was  68  years  old,  and  was  one  of  the  early  settlers 
of  Newbury,  Mass.,  which  was  organized  in  1642.     He 
wrote  a  poem  on  the  death  of  Governor  Winthrop,  and 
died  in  Newbury,  8  January,  166f  < 

2.  Perceval  Lowell  brought  with  him  to  America  two 
sons,  JOHN  and  RICHARD,  and  a  daughter  JOAN.     John, 
the  elder  brother,  was  made  a  Freeman  in  1641 ;  he  was 
a  deputy  from  Newbury  to  the  General  Court  in  1643- 
1644.     He  died  in  Newbury  in  1647,  aged  52  years. 

3.  His  son  JOHN  was  born  in  England,  and  came  to 
America  when  he  was  ten  years  old,  with  his  father  and 
grandfather.     He  was  a  cooper  by  trade,  and  made  his 
home  first  in  Boston  and  then  in  Scituate.    He  was  thrice 
married,  the  third  time  to  Naomi  Sylvester,  a  sister  of 
his  second  wife ;  he  moved  later  to  Rehoboth,  Mass.,  but 
finally  returned  to  Boston,  where  he  died  7  June,  1694. 
He  had  nineteen  children  in  all. 

4.  EBENEZER  LOWELL,  fifteenth  son  of  John  Lowell, 

1  For  these  details  I  am  indebted  to  statements  made  by  Mrs. 
Mary  Lowell  Putnam  and  to  The  Historic  Genealogy  of  the  Lowells 
of  America  from  1639  to  1899.  Compiled  and  edited  by  Delmar 
R.  Lowell. 


410  APPENDIX 

his  mother  being  Naomi  [Sylvester]  Lowell,  was  born 
in  Boston  in  1675,  and  married  in  1694  Elizabeth 
Shailer.  He  was  a  cordwainer,  which  sounds  more 
dignified  than  shoemaker,  and  died  in  Boston,  10  Sep 
tember,  1711. 

5.  JOHN  LOWELL,   son  of  Ebenezer  and  Elizabeth 
[Shailer]  Lowell,  was  born  in  Boston,  14  March,  170f . 
He  was  graduated  from  Harvard  in  1721,  and  married* 
Sarah,  daughter  of  Noah  and  Sarah  [Turell]  Champ- 
ney,  23  December,  1725.     On  19  January,  1726,  he  was 
ordained  pastor  of  the  Third  Parish  in  Newbury,  which 
became  the  First  Parish  in  Newburyport,  when  under 
that  name  the  part  of  Newbury  up  to  that  time  desig 
nated  the  Waterside  was  set  off  as  a  separate  township 
in  1764.     Mrs.  Lowell  died  in  1756,  and  the  Rev.  John 
Lowell  married  again  in  1758  Elizabeth,  daughter  of 
Robert  Cutts,  Jr.,  and  widow  of  the  Rev.  Joseph  Whip- 
pie.     The  Rev.  John  Lowell  died  in  Newburyport,  15 
May,  1767. 

6.  JOHN,  son  of  John  and  Sarah  [Champney]  Low 
ell,  was   born  in  Newbury,  17  June,  1743.      He  took 
his  bachelor's  degree  at  Harvard  in  1760,  and  under 
the    arrangement    of   those   days,   which    recorded   the 
members  of  a  class  in  order  of  social  dignity,  he  was 
seventh  in  a  class  of  twenty-seven.     He  studied  law  in 
Boston  with  Oxenbridge  Thacher   [H.  U.  1698],  and 
was  admitted  to  practice  in  1763.     He  returned  to  his 
native  town  and  at  once  became  prominent  in  public 
affairs.    In  1767  he  drew  up  a  report  upon  a  letter  from 
the  selectmen  of  Boston  concerning  the  measures  to  be 
taken  to  frustrate  the  encroachments  of  Great  Britain. 
He  served  for  several  years  as  one  of  the  selectmen  of 
Newburyport,  and  in  May,  1776,  was  one  of  the  five 
representatives  of  the  town  in  the  General  Court.     He 


APPENDIX  411 

removed  to  Boston  in  1777,  and  the  next  year  was 
chosen  a  representative  to  the  General  Court  from  Bos 
ton.  In  1779  he  was  elected  a  member  of  the  conven 
tion  for  framing  the  constitution  of  the  State.  In  1781 
he  was  chosen  a  delegate  to  the  Continental  Congress. 
In  1782  he  was  appointed  by  Congress  one  of  the  three 
judges  of  the  newly  created  Admiralty  court  of  appeals. 
In  1784  he  was  one  of  the  commissioners  to  establish 
the  boundary  line  between  Massachusetts  and  New 
York.  On  the  adoption  of  the  constitution  of  the 
United  States,  President  Washington  appointed  him 
Judge  of  the  U.  S.  District  Court  in  Massachusetts. 
In  1801  he  was  appointed  Chief  Justice  of  the  Circuit 
Court  for  the  first  circuit,  under  the  new  organization  of 
the  judiciary. 

He  married,  in  1767,  Sarah,  daughter  of  Stephen  and 
Elizabeth  [Cabot]  Higginson,  and  had  by  her  three 
children,  Anna  Cabot,  John,  and  Sarah  Champney. 
His  wife,  Sarah,  died  5  May,  1772,  and  he  married 
again,  31  May,  1774,  Susanna,  daughter  of  Francis 
and  Mary  [Fitch]  Cabot,  by  whom  he  had  two  children, 
Francis  Cabot,  founder  of  the  factory  system  in  Low 
ell,  and  Susanna.  His  second  wife,  Susanna,  died  30 
March,  1777,  and  he  married  a  third  time  Rebecca, 
daughter  of  James  and  Katharine  [Graves]  Russell,  of 
Charlestown,  and  widow  of  James  Tyng,  of  Dunstable, 
Mass.  By  her  he  had  four  children,  Rebecca  Russell, 
Charles,  Elizabeth  Cutts,  and  Mary.  He  died  in  Rox- 
bury,  Mass.,  6  May,  1802. 

He  was  for  eighteen  years  a  member  of  the  corpora 
tion  of  Harvard  College,  and  was  one  of  the  founders  of 
the  American  Academy  of  Arts  and  Sciences.  His  son, 
the  Rev.  Charles  Lowell,  stated  :  "  My  father  introduced 
into  the  Bill  of  Rights  the  clause  by  which  slavery  was 


412  APPENDIX 

abolished  in  Massachusetts.  My  father  advocated  its 
adoption  in  the  convention,  and  when  it  was  adopted, 
exclaimed :  '  Now  there  is  no  longer  slavery  in  Massa 
chusetts  ;  it  is  abolished  and  I  will  render  my  services 
as  a  lawyer  gratis  to  any  slave  suing  for  his  freedom  if 
it  is  withheld  from  him/  or  words  to  that  effect." 

7.  CHARLES  LOWELL,  son  of  John  and  Rebecca 
[Russell]  Lowell,  was  born  in  Boston,  15  August,  1782. 
He  was  graduated  from  Harvard  College  in  1800,  trav 
elled  in  Europe  1802-1805,  and  on  his  return  to  Boston 
was  made  pastor  of  the  West  Congregational  Church 
in  that  town,  and  remained  its  pastor,  either  active  or 
emeritus,  till  he  died.  He  was  married,  2  October, 
1806,  to  Harriet  Brackett,  daughter  of  Keith  and  Mary 
[Traill]  Spence.  He  was  elected  a  member  of  the 
Massachusetts  Historical  Society  in  1815,  and  was  its 
recording  Secretary  from  1818  to  1833,  and  correspond 
ing  Secretary  from  1833  to  1849.  He  was  stricken 
with  partial  paralysis  in  the  autumn  of  1851,  and  died 
20  January,  1861. 

The  children  of  Charles  and  Harriet  Traill  [Spence] 
Lowell,  were 

1.  Charles  Russell,  born  30  October,  1807  ;  he  mar 
ried  Anna  Cabot  Jackson,  18  April,  1832,  and 
died  23  June,  1870  ;  their  children  were 

i.  Anna  Cabot  Jackson,  married  to  Dr.  Henry 

Elisha  Woodbury. 

ii.  Charles  Russell,  Jr.,  commissioned  Briga 
dier  General,  who  died  20  October, 
1864,  from  wounds  received  at  the  bat 
tle  of  Cedar  Creek. 

iii.  Harriet,  married  to  George  Putnam. 
iv.  James  Jackson,  commissioned  first  lieuten 
ant,  20  Massachusetts  Volunteers,  and 


APPENDIX  413 

died  4  July,  1862,  from  wounds  received 
at  Glendale,  Va.,  five  days  previous. 

2.  Rebecca  Russell,  born  17  January,  1809  ;  died,  un 

married,  20  May,  1872. 

3.  Mary  Traill  Spence,  born  3  December,  1810,  died 

1  June,  1898  ;  she  married,  25  April,  1832,  Sam 
uel  Raymond  Putnam,  and  their  children  were  — 
i.  Alfred  Lowell  Putnam, 
ii.  Georgina  Lowell  Putnam, 
iii.  William  Lowell  Putnam,  who  was  commis 
sioned  10  July,  1861,  2d  lieutenant,  20th 
Massachusetts  Volunteers,  and  was  killed 
in  the  battle  of  Ball's  Bluff,  21  October, 
1861. 
iv.  Charles  Lowell  Putnam. 

4.  William  Keith  Spence,  born  23  September,  1813 ; 

died  12  February,  1823. 

5.  Robert  TraiU  Spence,  born  8  October,  1816,  died 

12  September,  1891 ;  he  married  Marianna  Du- 
ane,  28  October,  1845,  and  their  children  were  — 
i.  Harriet  Brackett  Spence. 
ii.  Marianna. 
iii.  Percival. 
iv.  James  Duane. 
v.  Charles, 
vi.  Rebecca  Russell, 
vii.  Robert  Traill  Spence,  Jr. 

6.  JAMES  RUSSELL,  born  22  February,  1819 ;  died  12 

August,  1891. 

When  the  Rev.  Delmar  R.  Lowell  was  collecting  ma 
terial  for  The  Historic  Genealogy  of  the  Lowells  of 
America,  he  had  for  use  two  letters  from  Lowell,  which 
he  has  printed  in  facsimile  in  his  volume,  and  kindly 
permits  me  to  copy. 


414  APPENDIX 

ELMWOOD,  12  July,  1875. 

DEAR  SIR,  —  Whether  Coffin  was  right  in  making 
Ebenezer  born  in  1685  or  no,  I  cannot  say,  but  Rev. 
John  L.  of  Newbury  was  son  of  an  Ebenezer,  and  I 
doubt  if  there  were  two  contemporaneous  with  each 
other.  This  John  —  my  great-grandfather,  can  hardly 
have  doubted  his  descent  from  Perceval,  since  I  have 
books  from  his  library  in  which  he  spells  his  name 
Lowle ;  and  I  have  always  understood  that  a  silver  seal 
of  arms  (in  my  brother's  possession)  came  from  him. 
My  father  (as  you  rightly  suppose)  had  more  know 
ledge  on  this  point  than  any  one  else,  but  I  fear  he 
never  made  any  written  record  of  it.  If  I  should  find 
any  such,  I  shall  gladly  communicate  it  to  you.  That 
you  and  I  are  kinsmen  I  have  never  doubted  since  I 
had  the  pleasure  of  seeing  you  some  thirty  odd  years 
ago ;  when  I  was  struck  with  your  likeness  to  the  por 
trait  of  my  ancestor,  the  Rev.  John  of  Newbury.  As 
he  graduated  in  1721,  his  father  must  have  been  born 
earlier  than  1685,  one  would  think,  unless,  indeed,  the 
parson  was  as  precocious  as  his  son  and  grandson,  both 
of  whom  graduated  before  they  were  seventeen.  But 
this  is  hardly  probable.  Ebenezer's  father,  I  remember, 
Was  named  John. 

My  father  had  talked  with  men  who  remembered  his 
great-grandfather,  Ebenezer,  as  a  very  respectable  old 
gentleman  with  a  goldheaded  cane.  Dining  once  with  a 
friend  in  Philadelphia,  I  was  surprised  to  see  a  hand 
some  tankard  with  our  arms  on  it.  He  told  me  it  came 
to  him  by  inheritance  from  the  Shippens,  one  of  whom 
had  married  a  Lowell.  I  believe  we  have  the  right  to 
quarter  Levesege,  one  of  our  forbears  having  married 
an  heiress  of  that  name.  Theirs  is  a  very  pretty  coat, 
three  dolphins  passant,  or. 


APPENDIX  415 

If  you  are  making  out  a  pedigree  you  must  be  on 
your  guard,  for  I  have  been  told  that  all  the  foundlings 
of  the  city  of  Lowell  (and  there  are  a  good  many  of 
them)  are  christened  with  the  name.  And  it  is  some 
times  assumed.  Some  twenty  years  ago  I  received  a 
letter  from  a  person  in  New  York  informing  me  that 
he  was  about  to  assume  the  name.  I  paid  no  attention 
to  the  letter,  thinking  it  a  trick  (as  I  am  sometimes 
the  subject  of  such)  to  get  an  autograph,  but,  sure 
enough,  he  presently  sent  me  a  newspaper  in  which 
was  advertised  a  legal  authentication  of  his  change  of 
name. 

The  family  came  from  Yardley  in  Worcestershire, 
where,  I  believe,  some  monuments  of  them  remain  in 
the  churchyard.  They  were  a  visitation  family.  I 
hoped  to  visit  Yardley  the  last  time  I  was  in  England, 
but  was  prevented  by  being  suddenly  summoned  to 
Cambridge  to  receive  a  degree.  The  only  Lowells  now 
left  in  England  that  I  could  find  are  the  descendants  of 
Rev.  Samuel  of  Bristol,  England,  who  went  back  from 
America — or,  rather,  whose  father  went.  My  father 
saw  him  in  England  seventy  years  ago,  and  the  relation 
ship  between  them  was  recognized  on  both  sides.  How 
near  it  was  I  have  no  means  of  knowing.  I  have  some 
where,  but  cannot  lay  my  hand  on  it,  a  deed  of  the  first 
John  Lowle  of  Newbury.  It  is  witnessed  by  Somebody 
who  came  out  as  clerk  with  Perceval,  and  seems  to  be 
in  his  handwriting.  How  we  are  descended  from  Perce 
val  I  know  not,  but  Ebenezer  must  have  known  who  his 
grandfather  was,  and  his  son  would  hardly  have  ven 
tured  (in  those  more  scrupulous  days)  to  have  assumed 
arms  that  did  not  belong  to  him.  Perceval  wrote  some 
verses  (neither  better  nor  worse  than  such  usually  are) 
on  the  death  of  the  first  Governor  Winthrop.  You  will 


416  APPENDIX 

find  them  (with  a  palpable  error  or  two  of  copier  or 
printer)  in  the  appendix  to  the  second  volume  of  Win- 
throp's  "  Life  and  Letters." 

I  remain, 

Very  truly  yours, 

J.  R.  LOWELL. 


ELMWOOD,  23d  July,  1875. 

DEAR  SIR,  —  I  have  no  doubt  you  are  right  in  put 
ting  the  birth  of  Ebenezer  L.  in  1675.  My  father  in 
his  family  Bible  says  he  died  "  in  1711  cet.  36."  The 
faded  ink  shows  that  this  was  written  many  years  ago, 
and  I  have  no  doubt  he  had  authority  for  it.  He  goes 
on  to  say  that  his  widow  "  married  Philip  Bougardus, 
Esq.,  and  died  1761,  leaving  one  daughter  married  to 
Eneas  Mackay." 

I  have  searched  in  vain  for  a  bundle  of  pedigrees 
(collected  by  my  father)  which  seem  to  have  gone  astray 
during  my  two  years'  absence  in  Europe.  They  carried 
the  family  back  to  the  thirteenth  century  (I  think),  and 
were  obtained  from  the  Heralds'  Office. 

I  don't  wonder  you  think  the  blunted  arrows  un 
sightly.  They  are  all  wrong.  The  arms  are  a  hand 
grasping  three  crossbow  bolts,  a  very  different  thing, 
and  with  very  formidable  points  to  them,  as  I  trust  those 
of  the  family  will  always  have.  I  brought  home  three 
of  them  from  Germany  in  '52.  They  are  shaped  thus 

•|  |  Q> ,  the  shaft  of  oak,  the  feathers  of  lighter 

wood,  and  the  head  steel.  The  transverse  section  of 
the  head  would  be  a  diamond  ^. 

I  think  it  plain  that  my  father  knew  all  about  Eben- 


APPENDIX  417 

ezer,  wherever  he  got  it.     If  I  can  aid  you  in  any  way, 
I  shall  be  glad  to  do  so. 

I  remain, 

Very  truly  yours, 

J.  R.  LOWELL. 


II.  Maternal.1 

1.  ROBERT  CUTT   is   supposed   to   have  come  from 
England  to  this  country  previous  to  1646,  going  first  to 
the  Barbadoes,  where  he  married  Mary  Hoel,  and  after 
ward   to  Portsmouth,   N.  H.      He  removed   thence  to 
Kittery,  Me.,  and  died  there  18  June,  1674. 

2.  ROBERT,  sixth  child  of  Robert  and  Mary  [Hoel] 
Cutt,  was  born  in  1673.     He  married  Dorcas   Ham 
mond,  18  April,  1698,  and  died  24  September,  1735. 

3.  MARY,   daughter   of   Robert  and  Dorcas   [Ham 
mond]  Cutt,  was  born  26  December,  1698.     She  mar 
ried,  16  May,  1722,  William  Whipple,  afterward  one  of 
the    signers  of   the  Declaration  of   Independence,   and 
died  28  February,  1783. 

3a.  ELIZABETH,  sister  of  Mary  (3),  was  born  20 
March,  1709.  She  married,  20  March,  1709,  Rev. 
Joseph  Whipple,  brother  of  William  Whipple,  just 
named ;  and  after  his  death  she  married  for  her  second 
husband,  23  October,  1727,  Rev.  John  Lowell  (son  of 
Ebenezer). 

4.  MARY,  daughter   of   William   and  Mary  [Cutt] 

1  As  Mrs.  Lowell's  paternal  ancestry  went  back  but  two  gen 
erations  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic,  it  has  been  thought  well  to 
trace  her  grandmother's  descent  from  Robert  Cutt  [the  name 
later  becoming  Cutts],  who  was  in  the  same  generation  with  John 
Lowell,  the  son  of  the  first  Perceval  Lowell.  I  am  indebted  for 
most  of  this  material  to  Genealogy  of  the  Cutts  Family  in  America, 
compiled  by  Cecil  Hampden  Cutts  Howard.  Albany  :  Joel  Mun- 
sell's  Sons.  1892. 


418  APPENDIX 

Whipple,  was  born  13  January  17 f  f,  married,  1  Sep 
tember,  1748,  Robert  Traill,  a  merchant  in  Portsmouth, 
from  the  Orkney  Isles,  who  remained  a  British  subject, 
and  left  the  country  in  November,  1775.  Mary  [Whip- 
pie]  TraiU  died  3  October,  1791.  Robert  Traill,  after 
the  Revolution,  was  a  collector  of  the  revenues  in  the 
Bermudas. 

5.  MARY,  only  daughter  of  Robert  and  Mary  [Whip- 
pie]    Traill,    baptized   24   May,   1753,   married   Keith 
Spence,  of  Kirkwall,  Orkney,  who  had  settled  as  a  mer 
chant  in  Portsmouth.     Later  he  became  purser  of  the 
frigate  Philadelphia.     Mrs.   Spence  died  18  January, 
1824. 

6.  HARRIET  BRACKETT,  daughter  of  Keith  and  Mary 
Whipple  [Traill]  Spence,  was  born  26  July,  1783  ;  she 
married  the  Rev.  Charles  Lowell,  2  October,  1806,  and 
died  30  March,  1850. 

CHILDREN    OF   JAMES    RUSSELL   AND   MARIA    [  WHITE] 
LOWELL. 

1.  Blanche,  born  31  December,  1845  ;  died  19  March, 
1847. 

2.  Mabel,  born  9  September,  1847.     She  married,  2 
April,  1872,  Edward  Burnett,  of  Southborough,  and  died 
at  Elmwood,  30  December,  1898.     Their  children  are : 

i.  James  Russell  Lowell  Burnett,  now  Barnes 
Burnett  Lowell,  his  name  having  been 
changed  at  the  request  of  his  grandfather, 
ii.  Joseph, 
iii.  Francis  Lowell, 
iv.  Esther  Lowell, 
v.  Lois. 

3.  Rose,  born  16  July,  1849  ;  died  2  February  1850. 

4.  Walter,  born  22  December,  1850;  died  9  June, 
1852. 


B.    "LIST   OF  COPIES  OF   THE    CONVERSATIONS  TO 
BE  GIVEN  AWAY  BY  THE  'DON'" 

This  is  the  heading  of  a  sheet  in  his  own  handwriting 
which  Lowell  drew  up  for  Robert  Carter's  instruction. 
He  entrusted  the  distribution  of  the  books  to  his  friend, 
as  he  himself  was  off  on  his  wedding  journey. 

1.  W.  L.  Garrison,  with  author's  respects. 

2.  C.  F.  Briggs  (by  Wiley  &  Putnam,  N.  Y.),  with 

author's  love. 

3.  Mrs.  Chapman,  with  author's  affectionate  regards. 

4.  T.  W.  Parsons,  copy  of  Poems  and  Conversations 

with  author's  love  (a  note  to  go  with  these). 

5.  John  S.  Dwight  (left  at  Monroe's  bookstore,  Bos 

ton),  with  author's  love. 

6.  W.  Page,  with  author's  love. 

7.  R.  C.,  with  author's  love. 

8.  Rev.  Dr.  Lowell.     Dedication  Copy.     Ask  Owen 

to  send  it  up. 

9.  Charles  R.  Lowell,  Jr.,  with  uncle's  love  (No.  1 

Winter  Place). 

10.  Rev.    Chandler   Robbins,   with   author's   sincere 
regards  (Monroe's  bookstore). 

13.  J.  R.  L.  3,  through  Antislavery  office,  care  J.  M. 

McKim. 

14.  Mr.  Nichols  (printing  office),  with  author's  sincere 

regards, 

f  15.  R.  W.   Emerson,  with   author's  affectionate  re 
spects. 
(  16.  N.  Hawthorne,  with  author's  love. 


/  ^  A  / 

^  VN 

\5  \ 


420  APPENDIX 

Both  these  in  one  package,  directed  to  Hawthorne 
and  left  at  Miss  Peabody's. 

17.  Frank  Shaw,  with  author's  love. 

18.  C.  W.  Storey,  Jr.,  with  happy  New  Year.     I  sup 

pose  Mr.  Owen  will  allow  me  20  copies,  as  he 
did  of  the  Poems. 

If  the  "  Don  "  thinks  of  any  more  which  I  have  for 
gotten,  let  him  send  them  with  judicious  in 
scriptions. 

19.  "  To  Miss  S.  C.  Lowell,  with  the  best  New  Year's 

wishes  of  her  affectionate  nephew,  the  author." 
(Mr.  Owen  will  send  this  up.) 

20.  Joseph  T.   Buckingham,  Esq.,  with   author's  re 

gards  and  thanks. 

A  letter  to  Lowell  from  John  Owen,  dated  10  April 
1845,  mentions  a  copy  of  the  book  which  Lowell  had 
sent  with  a  letter  to  Miss  Bronte. 


C.  A  LIST  OF  THE  WRITINGS  OF  JAMES  RUS 
SELL  LOWELL,  ARRANGED  AS  NEARLY  AS 
MAY  BE  IN  ORDER  OF  PUBLICATION 

NOTE.  Titles  of  Poems  are  set  in  Italic  type.  Titles  of  books  are  in  small 
capitals,  either  ROMAN  or  ITALIC,  as  the  books  are  in  prose  or  verse.  Conjec 
tural  writings  have  their  titles  enclosed  in  brackets. 

[The  titles  as  far  as  the  Class  Poem  are  of  contributions  to 
Harvardiana.] 

1837. 

Imitation  of  Burns.     September. 
Dramatic  Sketch.     September. 
New  Poem  of  Homer.     September. 
A  Voice  from  the  Tombs.     October. 
What  is  it  ?     October. 
Hints  to  Theme  Writers.     October. 
Obituary.     October. 
The  Serenade.     October. 
The  Old  Bell.     October. 
The  Idler,  No.  I.     November. 
Saratoga  Lake.     November. 
Hints  to  Reviewers.     November. 
Skilly goliana,  I.     November. 

1838. 

Scenes  from  an  Unpublished  Drama,  by  the  late  G.  A.  Slimton, 

esq.     January. 
Skilly  goliana,  II.     January. 

Chapters  from  the  Life  of  Philomelus  Prig.     February. 
Skilly  goliana,  III.     February. 
The  Idler,  No.  II.     March. 
Skillygoliana,  IV.     April. 
A  Dead  Letter.     May. 


422  APPENDIX 

[Extracts  from  a  Hasty  Pudding  Poem.]     June. 
Translations  from  Uhland.    i.  Das  Standehen  ;  ii.  Der  Weisse 

Hirsch.     June. 

To  Mount  Washington,  on  a  second  visit.    July. 
Song  :  "  A  pair  of  black  eyes."     July. 
CLASS  POEM.  \  "  Some  said,  John,  print  it ;  others  said,  Not 

so  ;  |   Some   said,  It  might  do  good  ;  others  said,  No."  | 

Bunyan.   |  MDCCCXXXVIII.   |  Poem   dated,  Concord, 

August  21,  1838. 

1839. 

Song:  "Ye  Yankees  of  the  Bay  State."     Boston  Post,  27 

February. 
Threnodia  on  an  Infant.    Southern  Literary  Messenger,  May. 

Signed  H.  P. 

1840. 

[All  the  contributions  this  year  were  to  the  Southern  Liter 
ary  Messenger.] 

Sonnet :  "  Verse  cannot  tell  thee  how  beautiful  thou  art." 

March.     Signed  H.  P. 
Song :  "  What  reck  I  of  the  stars  when  I."  March.     Signed 

H.  P. 
Sonnet :    "  My  friend,  I   pray  thee  call   not  this  Society." 

March.     Signed  H.  P. 
The  Serenade:    "Gentle,  Lady,  be  thy   sleeping."      April. 

Signed  H.  P. 

Music.     May.     Signed  H.  P. 

Song :  "  O,  I  must  look  on  that  sweet  face  once  more  be 
fore  I  die."     June.     Signed  H.  P. 
Song:  "Lift  up  the  curtains  of  thine  eyes."     June.     Signed 

H.  P. 
Sonnet :   "  O,  child   of  nature  !  oh,  most  meek   and  free." 

June.     Signed  H.  P. 
Isabel.     June. 

The  Bobolink.     July.     Signed  H.  P. 
lanthe.     July.     Signed  H.  P. 
Flowers.     July.     Signed  H.  P. 


APPENDIX  423 


1841. 

A.  \  YEAR'S  LIFE.  \  by  \  James  Russell  Lowell.  \  Scl) 
fldebt  unb  Cjdicbet.  |  Boston  :   |  C.  C.  Little  and  J.  Brown  | 
MDCCCXLI. 

Callirhoe,  by  H.  Perceval,  dated  1841.  Graham's  Magazine, 
March. 

Ballad:  "  Gloomily  the  river  floweth."  Graham's  Magazine, 
October. 

Merry  England.     Graham's  Magazine,  November. 

The  Loved  One.  National  Anti-Slavery  Standard,  16  De 
cember. 

Sonnet :  "  Great  truths  are  portions  of  the  soul  of  man." 
The  Liberty  Bell. 

1842. 

Sonnet  to  Keats,  dated  March,  1841.  Boston  Miscellany, 
January. 

[Agatha'],  dated  September,  1840.  Boston  Miscellany,  Janu 
ary. 

To  Perdita  Singing,  dated  February,  1841.  Boston  Miscel 
lany,  January. 

Song :  "  Violet !  sweet  violet !  "  Graham's  Magazine,  Janu 
ary. 

Sonnet :  To  the  Spirit  of  Keats.     Arcturus,  January. 

Sonnet :  Sunset  and  Moonshine.     Arcturus,  January. 

Sonnet:  "Poet!  thou  art  most  wealthy,  being  poor,"  dated 
November  25,  1841.  Arcturus,  February. 

An  Ode :  "  In  the  Old  Days  of  awe  and  keen-eyed  wonder," 
dated  December,  1841.  Boston  Miscellany,  February. 

Sonnet :  "  Like  some  black  mountain  glooming  huge  aloof," 
dated  October,  1841.  Boston  Miscellany,  February. 

Rosaline.     Graham's  Magazine,  February. 

Sonnet :  "  If  some  small  savor  creep  into  my  rhymes."  Gra 
ham's  Magazine,  February. 

Fancies  about  a  Rosebud  pressed  in  an  old  copy  of  Spenser. 
Graham's  Magazine,  March. 

[Getting  up.]     Boston  Miscellany,  March. 


424  APPENDIX 

[Disquisition   on  Foreheads.     By  Job   Simifrons.]     Boston 

Miscellany,  March. 

The  Old  English  Dramatists.    (Unsigned.)    Boston  Miscel 
lany,  April. 
Sonnet:  "Whene'er  I  read  in  mournful  history,"  dated  25 

September,  1841.     Boston  Miscellany,  May. 
The  Old  English  Dramatists,  No.  II.     Boston  Miscellany, 

May. 

The  Two,  dated  November,  1840.     Boston  Miscellany,  May. 
The  First  Client.     (Unsigned.)     Boston  Miscellany,  May. 
Sonnet :  "  My  Father,  since  I  love,  thy  presence  cries,"  dated 

November  29,  1841.     Arcturus,  May. 
Sonnet :  "  The  hope  of  truth  grows  stronger  day  by  day," 

dated  December  10,  1841.     Arcturus,  May. 
Sonnet :    "  I  love   those   poets,  of   whatever   creed,"   dated 

April  20,  1841.     Arcturus,  May. 
Sonnets : 

I.  "  As  the  broad  ocean  endlessly  upheaveth." 
II.  "  Once  hardly  in  a  cycle  blossometh." 

III.  "  The  love  of  all  things  springs  from  love  of  one." 

IV.  "  A  poet  cannot  strive  for  despotism." 

V.  «  Therefore  think  not  the  Past  is  wise  alone." 
VI.  "  Far  'yond  this  narrow  parapet  of  time." 

The  United  States  Magazine  and  Democratic  Review, 

May. 

Reprinted  in  Poems  as  "  On  reading  Wordsworth's  Son 
nets  in  Defence  of  Capital  Punishment." 
Farewell.     Graham's  Magazine,  June. 
A  Dirge.     Graham's  Magazine,  July. 
A  Fantasy,  dated   12   January,  1842.     Boston  Miscellany 

July. 

[  The  True  Radical.']     Boston  Miscellany,  August. 
The  Old  English  Dramatists,  No.  III.     Boston  Miscellany, 

August. 
Sonnet:  "  Poet,  if  men  from  wisdom  turn  away."  (Unsigned.) 

National  Anti-Slavery  Standard,  1  September. 
The  Shepherd  of  King  Admetus.     Boston   Miscellany,  Sep 
tember. 


APPENDIX  425 

An  Incident  in  a  "Railroad  Car,  dated  Boston,  April,  1842. 
The  United  States  Magazine  and  Democratic  Review, 
October. 

[To  an  Molian  Harp  at  Night],  dated  February,  1842.  Bos 
ton  Miscellany,  December. 

Sonnet :  "  Great  Truths  are  portions  of  the  Soul  of  man." 
The  Liberty  Bell. 

Sonnet :  "  If  ye  have  not  the  one  great  lesson  learned."  The 
Liberty  Bell. 

Pierpont:  "The  hungry  flames  did   never  yet  seem  hot." 

The  Liberty  Bell. 

1843. 

Introduction.     The  Pioneer,  January. 

[  Voltaire.]     The  Pioneer,  January. 

[The  Follower.']     The  Pioneer,  January. 

Sonnet:  "Our  love  is   not  a   fading  earthly  flower."     The 

Pioneer,  January. 

The  Plays  of  Thomas  Middleton.     The  Pioneer,  January. 
The  Rose.     The  Pioneer,  January. 

>  [Dickens's  "  American  Notes."]     The  Pioneer,  January. 
[Hawthorne's  Historical   Tales  for  Youth.]     The  Pioneer, 

January. 
A  Parable.     The  United  States  Magazine  and  Democratic 

Review,  February. 

The  Moon.     Graham's  Magazine,  February. 
Song  Writing.     The  Pioneer,  February. 
To  M.  0.  S.     The  Pioneer,  February. 
[The  Book  of  British  Ballads.]     The  Pioneer,  February. 

>  [Longfellow's  "  Poems  on  Slavery."]     The  Pioneer,  Febru 

ary. 

[Macaulay's  "  Lays  of  Ancient  Rome."]  The  Pioneer,  Feb 
ruary. 

[Two  Sonnets  to  Wordsworth."]     Graham's  Magazine,  March. 

The  Street.     The  Pioneer,  March. 

Stanzas  on  Freedom,  sung  at  the  Anti-Slavery  Picnic  in  Ded- 
ham,  on  the  Anniversary  of  West-Indian  Emancipation, 
1  August. 

In  Sadness.     Graham's  Magazine,  August. 


426  APPENDIX 

Prometheus,  dated  Cambridge,  Mass.,  June,  1843.  The 
United  States  Magazine  and  Democratic  Review,  August. 

Forgetfulness.  New  York  Mirror  [copied  into  National 
Anti-Slavery  Standard,  7  September.] 

A  Glance  behind  the  Curtain.  The  United  States  Magazine 
and  Democratic  Review,  September. 

A  Reverie.     Graham's  Magazine,  October. 

The  Fatherland.  The  United  States  Magazine  and  Demo 
cratic  Review,  October. 

POEMS  |  by  |  James  Russell  Lowell.  |  Cambridge  :  |  Pub 
lished  by  John  Owen.  |  MDCCCXLIV. 

1844. 

Rallying  Cry  for  New  England  against  the  Annexation  of 

Texas,  by  a  Yankee.     Boston  Courier,  19  March. 
New  Translations  of  the  Writings  of  Miss  Bremer.     North 

American  Review,  April. 
Introduction  to  Whittier's  "  Texas :   Voice  of  New  England" 

Boston  Courier,  17  April. 

A  Mystical  Ballad.     Graham's  Magazine,  May. 
New-Year's  Eve,  1844  j  a  Fragment.     Graham's  Magazine, 

July. 
On  the  Death  of  a  Friend's  Child,  dated  Cambridge,  Mass., 

September  3,  1844.     The  United   States   Magazine  and 

Democratic  Review,  October. 
A  Chippewa  Legend.     The  Liberty  Bell. 
CONVERSATIONS   |  ON  SOME  OF  |  THE  OLD   POETS  |  by  | 

James  Russell  Lowell  | 

"  Or,  if  I  would  delight  my  private  hours 
With  music  or  with  poem,  where,  so  soon 
As  in  our  native  language,  can  I  find 
That  solace  ?" 

PAKADISE  REGAINED. 

Cambridge  :  |  Published  by  John  Owen  |  MDCCCXLV. 

1845. 

To  the  Dandelion.     Graham's  Magazine,  January. 
A  Song  to  my  Wife.     The  Broadway  Journal,  4  January. 
The  Epitaph :  "  What  means  this  glosing  epitaph  ?  "  dated 


APPENDIX  427 

Rockwood,  7  February,  1844.  The  Broadway  Journal,  11 
January. 

Our  Position.     Pennsylvania  Freeman,  16  January. 

Now  is  always  best.     The  Broadway  Journal,  25  January. 

An  Epigram  on  Certain  Conservatives.  The  Broadway  Jour 
nal,  25  January. 

[Texas].     The  Pennsylvania  Freeman,  30  January. 

Anti-Texas,  written  on  occasion  of  the  Convention  in  Faneuil 
Hall,  January  29.  Boston  Courier,  30  January,  under  title 
Another  Rallying  Cry  by  a  Yankee. 

Edgar  Allan  Poe.     Graham's  Magazine,  February. 

[The  Prejudice  of  Color].  The  Pennsylvania  Freeman, 
13  February. 

Remembered  Music.     The  Broadway  Journal,  15  February. 

The  Pennsylvania  Academy  of  Fine  Arts.  The  Broadway 
Journal,  22  February. 

The  Church  and  the  Clergy.  The  Pennsylvania  Freeman, 
27  February,  27  March. 

The  Ghost-Seer.     The  Broadway  Journal,  8  March. 

[President  Tyler's  Message  on  the  African  Slave  Trade]. 
The  Pennsylvania  Freeman,  13  March. 

[The  Union].     The  Pennsylvania  Freeman,  10  April. 

An  Incident  of  the  Fire  at  Hamburg.  Graham's  Magazine, 
May. 

Review  of  Fitz-Greene  Halleck's  "  Alnwick  Castle,  with  other 
Poems."  The  Broadway  Journal,  3  May. 

Lines  on  reading  of  the  capture  of  certain  fugitive  slaves  near 
Washington.  Boston  Courier,  19  July. 

To  the  Future.     Graham's  Magazine,  August. 

Orpheus.     The  American  Review,  August. 

To  a  Pine  Tree,  dated  Elmwood,  July  16,  1845.  The  Har 
binger,  2  August. 

A  Contrast.     The  Liberty  Chime. 

The  Falconer,  afterward,  abridged,  The  Falcon,  dated  26  No 
vember,  1845.  The  Liberty  Bell. 

The  Happy  Martyrdom.     The  Liberty  Bell. 

Verses  suggested  by  the  Present  Crisis,  afterward  The  Present 
Crisis.  Boston  Courier,  11  December. 


428  APPENDIX 

An  Interview  with  Miles  Standish.  Boston  Courier,  30  De 
cember. 

1846. 

To  the  Past.     Graham's  Magazine,  January. 

Lines  on  the  Death  of  Charles  Turner  Torrey.  Boston  Cou 
rier,  23  May. 

Anti-Slavery  in  the  United  States.  London  Daily  News, 
2  February,  18  March,  17  April,  18  May. 

A  Letter  from  Mr.  Ezekiel  Biglow  of  Jaalam  to  the  Hon. 
Joseph  T.  Buckingham,  editor  of  the  Boston  Courier,  in 
closing  a  poem  of  his  son,  Mr.  Hosea  Biglow  (Biglow 
Papers,  I.)  Boston  Courier,  17  June. 

Daniel  Webster.     National  Anti-Slavery  Standard,1  2  July. 

The  Royal  Pedigree.     Boston  Courier,  4  December. 

The  Oak.     Standard,  31  December. 

1847. 

Letter  from  Boston,  postmarked  27  December,  1846.     The 

Pennsylvania  Freeman,  January. 
Above  and  Below.     The  Young  American,  January. 
Si  descendero  in  infernum,  ades.    The  Harbinger,  16  January. 
The  Search.     Standard,  25  February. 
The  New  Timon.     North  American  Review,  April. 
Hebe.     The  Young  American,  May. 
D'Israeli's  Tancred,  or  the  New  Crusade.     North  American 

Review,  July. 
Letter  from  a    Volunteer  in   Saltillo    (Biglow   Papers,   II.). 

Boston  Courier,  18  August. 

The  Landlord.     The  People's  Journal,  4  September. 
What   Mr.  Robinson   thinks  (Biglow  Papers,  III.).     Boston 

Courier,  2  November. 
Extreme  Unction.     The  Liberty  Bell. 
Remarks  of  Increase  D.  O'Phace,  esquire  (Biglow  Papers,  IV.). 

Boston  Courier,  28  December. 

1  Abbreviated  afterward  in  this  record  as  "  Standard." 


APPENDIX  429 

1848. 

POEMS  |  by  |  James  Russell  Lowell.  |  Second  series.  |  Cam 
bridge  :  Published  by  |  George  Nichols.  |    Boston  :  |  B.  B. 

Mussey  and  Company.  |     1848.     Copyright,  1847. 
Review  of  Tennyson's  "  Princess."    Massachusetts  Quarterly 

Review,  March. 
Browning's  Plays   and    Poems.     North  American   Review, 

April. 

Ode  to  France,  dated  February,  1848.     Standard,  6  April. 
The  French  Revolution  of  1848.     Standard,  13  April. 
Shall  we  ever  be  Republicans  ?     Standard,  20  April. 
The   Delate   in   the   Sennit    (Biglow   Papers,    V.).      Boston 

Courier,  3  May. 
The  Pious  Editor's  Creed  (Biglow  Papers,  VI.).     Standard, 

4  May. 

A  Parable.     Standard,  18  May. 
An  Imaginary  Conversation.     Standard,  18  May. 
A  Letter  from  a  Candidate  for  the  Presidency  (Biglow  Papers , 

VII.).     Standard,  1  June. 
The  Sacred  Parasol.     Standard,  8  June. 
Freedom.     Standard,  15  June. 

The  Nominations  for  the  Presidency.     Standard,  22  June. 
Sympathy  with  Ireland.     Standard,  29  June. 
A  Second  Letter  from  B.  Sawin,  esq.  (Biglow  Papers,  VIII.). 

Standard,  6  July. 

What  will  Mr.  Webster  do  ?     Standard,  13  July. 
Leaving  the  Matter  open,  a  Tale  by  Homer  Wilbur,  A.  M., 

reprinted  in  Introduction  to  Biglow  Papers.      Standard, 

27  July. 

To  Lamartine.     Standard,  3  August. 
The  Buffalo  Convention.     Standard,  10  August. 
The  Irish  Rebellion.     Standard,  24  August. 
Fanaticism  in  the  Navy.     Standard,  31  August. 
Exciting   Intelligence   from    South   Carolina.     Standard,  7 

September. 
Editorial  article,  beginning  :  "  When  we  first  went  to  the 

theatre,  that  which  delighted  us  most,  among  the  thousand 


430  APPENDIX 

and  one  marvels,  was  the  swiftness  with  which  a  change 
of  costume  was  effected."  Standard,  14  September. 

To  the  Memory  of  Hood.     Standard,  21  September. 

Another  Letter  from  B.  Sawin,  esq.  (Bigloiv  Papers,  IX.). 
Standard,  28  September. 

Editorial  article,  beginning  :  "  Chance  has  thrown  in  our  way 
a  stray  number  of  the  '  Christian  Observer.'  "  Standard, 
5  October. 

Review  of  "  The  Conquerors  of  the  New  World  and  their 
Bondsmen."  Standard,  12,  26  October. 

The  Day  of  Small  Things,  afterward  To  W.  L.  Garrison. 
Standard,  19  October. 

READER  !  Walk  up  at  once  (it  will  soon  be  too  late)  and  \  buy 
at  a  perfectly  ruinous  rate  a  |  FABLE  FOR  CRITICS  ; 
|  or  BETTER  —  |  /  like,  as  a  thing  that  the  reader's  first 
fancy  may  strike,  \  an  old-fashioned  title-page,  \  such  as  pre 
sents  a  tabular  view  of  the  volume's  contents  —  |  A  GLANCE 
|  AT  A  FEW  OF  OUR  LITERARY  PROGENIES  | 
(Mrs.  Malapropos  word)  \  from  |  THE  TUB  OF  DIOGENES  ;  | 
A  VOCAL  and  MUSICAL  MEDLEY.  |  THAT  is,  |  a  SERIES  OF 
JOKES.  |  BY  A  WONDERFUL  QUIZ,  |  who  accompanies 
himself  with  a  rub-a-dub-dub,  FULL  OF  SPIRIT  AND  GRACE,  | 
on  the  top  of  the  tub.  |  SET  FORTH  IN  |.  October  the  21st 
day,  in  the  year  '48.  BY  |  G.  P.  PUTNAM,  Broadway. 

Ode,  written  for  the  celebration  of  the  introduction  of  the 
Cochituate  water  into  the  city  of  Boston,  25  October. 

The  Ex-Mayor's  Crumb  of  Consolation :  a  Pathetic  Ballad. 
Standard,  26  October. 

To  John  G.  Palfrey.     Standard,  2  November. 

Calling  things  by  their  Right  Names.  Standard,  9  Novem 
ber. 

Melibceus  Hipponax.  |  THE  BlGLOW  PAPERS,  \  Edited, 
|  with  an  Introduction,  Notes,  Glossary,  |  and  Copious 
Index,  |  by  Homer  Wilbur,  A.  M.,  |  Pastor  of  the  First 
Church  in  Jaalam,  and  (prospective)  member  of  |  many 
Literary,  Learned  and  Scientific  societies,  |  (for  which  see 
page  v.)  \  Cambridge  :  Published  by  George  Nichols. 

The  Sower.     Standard,  16  November. 


APPENDIX  431 

Editorial  article,  beginning  :  "  If,  as  it  has  been  often  said, 
America  be  a  kind  of  posterity  in  relation  to  Europe." 
Standard,  23  November. 

Editorial  article,  beginning  :    "  The  recent  decision  of  the 

English  Government."     Standard,  30  November. 
~  The  Works  of  Walter  Savage  Landor.    Massachusetts  Quar 
terly  Review,  December. 

Ambrose.     Standard,  7  December. 

The  President's  Message.     Standard,  14  December. 

Review  of  Whittier's  Poems.     Standard,  14  December. 

El  Dorado.     Standard,  21  December.  . 

A  Washington  Monument.     Standard,  28  December.  ^-J ... 

1849. 

The  Mill,  afterward  Beaver  Brook.     Standard,  4  January. 

Editorial  article,  beginning  :  "  There  is  no  need  of  any  specu 
lation  as  to  the  course  Whigs  as  Whigs  will  take."  Stand 
ard,  11  January. 

Our  Southern  Brethren.     Standard,  18  January. 

Politics  and  the  Pulpit.     Standard,  25  January. 

Ethnology.     Standard,  1  February. 

The  Parting  of  the  Ways.     Standard,  8  February. 

Mr.  Calhoun's  Report.     Standard,  15  February. 

The  Moral  Movement  against  Slavery.  Standard,  22  Feb 
ruary. 

Editorial  article,  beginning  :  "  Next  to  the  charge  of  being 
possessed  with  only  a  single  idea."  Standard,  1  March. 

A  Day  in  June,  afterward,  enlarged,  Al  Fresco.  Standard, 
8  March. 

Editorial  article,  beginning  :  "  The  long  succession  of  Demo 
cratic  rulers  has  at  length  been  broken."  Standard,  15 
March. 

Mr.  Clay  as  an  Abolitionist.  —  Second  appearance  in  Fifty 
Years.  Standard,  22  March. 

Lines  suggested  by  the  Graves  of  Two  English  Soldiers  on 
Concord  Battle-Ground.  Standard,  29  March. 

An  Oriental  Apologue.     Standard,  12  April. 


432  APPENDIX 

Editorial  article,  beginning  :  "  The  German  poet  Schiller  in 
a  little  poem."  Standard,  19  April. 

Anti-Slavery  Criticism  upon  Mr.  Clay's  Letter.  Standard, 
26  April. 

King  Retro.     Standard,  10  May. 

Editorial  article,  beginning  :  "  In  the  Standard  of  April  19th 
an  article  was  copied."  Standard,  10  May. 

Bibliolatres.     Standard,  24  May. 

Mobs.     Standard,  14  June. 

Two  Sonnets,  afterward  named  Trial.     Standard,  28  June. 
^Longfellow's  Kavanagh  :  Nationality  in  Literature.     North 
American  Review,  July. 

The  Roman  Republic.     Standard,  12  July. 

Fourth  of  July  in  Charleston.     Standard,  26  July. 

Moderation.     Standard,  9  August. 

Eurydice.     Standard,  23  August. 

Kossuth.     Standard,  6  September. 

Editorial  article,  beginning  :  "  Our  readers  have  had,  from 
time  to  time,  the  privilege  of  seeing  extracts  from  South 
ern  newspapers."  Standard,  20  September. 

Editorial  article,  beginning  :  "  Every  now  and  then  we  see 
it  asserted."  Standard,  4  October. 

To :  "  We,  too,  have  autumns,  when  our  leaves."  Stand 
ard,  18  October. 

Canada.     Standard,  1  November. 

The  Lesson  of  the  Pine,  afterward  enlarged  and  entitled,  A 
Mood.  Standard,  15  November. 

California.     Standard,  29  November. 

*  Review  of  "  A  Week  on  the  Concord  and  Merrimack  Rivers," 
Massachusetts  Quarterly  Review,  December. 

General  Bern's  Conversion.     Standard,  6  December. 

Editorial  article,  beginning  :  "  The  last  European  steamer 
brings  us  what  is  said  to  be  the  final  determination  of  the 
Turkish  government  in  regard  to  the  Hungarian  exiles." 
Standard,  13  December. 

The  Burial  of  Theobald.     The  Liberty  Bell. 

The  First  Snow-Fail     Standard,  27  December. 


APPENDIX  433 

1850. 
What  shall   be  done  for  the   Hungarian   Exiles?     Boston 

Courier,  3  January. 

JVew  Year's  Eve,  1850.     Standard,  10  January. 
A  Review  of  Judd's  "  Philo."     Standard,  24  January. 
Editorial  article,  beginning  :  "  When  King  Log  first  made 

his  avatar  among  the  frogs."     Standard,  21  February. 
Compromise.     Standard,  7  March. 
Mr.  Webster's  Speech.     Standard,  21  March. 
Out  of  Doors.     Graham's  Magazine,  April. 
Editorial  article,   beginning  :    "  In  the  comment  which  we 

made  a  fortnight  ago  on  Mr.  Webster's  speech."     Stand 
ard,  4  April. 

Mahmood  the  Image  Breaker.     Standard,  18  April. 
Dara.     Graham's  Magazine,  July. 
The   Northern    Sancho   Panza  and  his    vicarious    Cork   tree. 

Standard,  18  July. 

Pseudo  Conservatism.     Standard,  14  November. 
A  Dream  I  had.     Standard,  28  November. 
To  J.  F.  H.,  afterward  An  Invitation  to  J.  F.  H.     Graham's 

Magazine,  December. 
Mr.  Bo  wen  and  the  Christian  Examiner,  I.     Boston  Daily 

Advertiser,  28  December. 

1851. 

Mr.  Bowen  and  the  Christian  Examiner,  II.     Boston  Daily 

Advertiser,  2  January. 
Anti-Apis.     Standard,  30  January. 
Appledore,  No.  V.,  in  Pictures  from  Appledore.     Graham's 

Magazine,  February. 

The  Unhappy  Lot  of  Mr.  Knott.     Graham's  Magazine,  April. 
On  Receiving  a  piece  of  Flax  Cotton,  dated  18  April,  1851. 

Standard,  1  May. 

1853. 

The  Fountain  of  Youth.     Putnam's  Magazine,  January. 

Our   Own,   his  Wanderings   and  Personal  Adventures.     Put* 

nam's  Magazine,  April,  May,  June. 
A  Moosehead  Journal.     Putnam's  Magazine,  November. 


434  APPENDIX 

1854. 

The  Singing  Leaves,     Graham's  Magazine,  January. 

A  Winter  Evening  Hymn  to  my  Fire.  Putnam's  Magazine, 
March. 

Without  and  Within.     Putnam's  Magazine,  April. 

Fireside  Travels.     Putnam's  Magazine,  April,  May. 

Leaves  from  my  Italian  Journal.  Graham's  Magazine,  April, 
May,  July. 

[  Without  and  Within,  II.  The  Restaurant]  Putnam's  Maga 
zine,  May. 

The  Windharp.     Putnam's  Magazine,  December. 

Auf  Wiedersehen.     Putnam's  Magazine,  December. 

1855. 

Hakon's  Lay.     Graham's  Magazine,  January. 

My  Appledore  Gallery,  No.  I.  August  afternoon,  afterward, 
with  changes  I.-IV.  of  Pictures  from  Appledore.  The 
Crayon,  3  January. 

My  Appledore  Gallery,  No.  II.  Sunset  and  Moonset,  after 
ward  VI.  of  Pictures  from  Appledore.  The  Crayon,  31 
January. 

Invita  Minerva.     The  Crayon,  30  May. 

1857. 

The  Origin  of  Didactic  Poetry.  Atlantic  Monthly,  Novem 
ber. 

Sonnet :  "  The  Maple  puts  her  corals  on  in  May."  Atlantic 
Monthly,  November. 

The  Round  Table.     Atlantic  Monthly,  November. 

My  Portrait  Gallery.     Atlantic  Monthly,  December. 

Memoir  of  Shelley,  prefixed  to  The  Poetical  Works  of  Percy 
Bysshe  Shelley.  Boston  :  Little,  Brown  &  Co. 

1858. 

Be'ranger  (translated  from  Sainte-Beuve).   Atlantic  Monthly, 

February. 
The  Nest.     Atlantic  Monthly,  March. 


APPENDIX  435 

Review  of  Guerrazzi's  Beatrice  Cenci.     Atlantic   Monthly, 

March. 

Happiness.     Atlantic  Monthly,  April. 

Mr.  Buchanan's  Administration.     Atlantic  Monthly,  April. 
Review    of    Smith's    Library   of    Old    Authors.      Atlantic 

Monthly,  April,  May. 

Epigram  on  J.  M.     Atlantic  Monthly,  May. 
Beatrice,  afterward  Das  Ewig-Weibliche.     Atlantic  Monthly, 

June. 

Shipwreck.     Atlantic  Monthly,  June. 
Review   of   Dramatic  Works   of  John  Webster.     Atlantic 

Monthly,  June. 

The  American  Tract  Society.     Atlantic  Monthly,  July. 
The  Trustees'  Lament.     Atlantic  Monthly,  August. 
The  Pocket  Celebration  of  the  Fourth.     Atlantic  Monthly, 

August. 

The  Dead  House.     Atlantic  Monthly,  October. 
A  Sample  of  Consistency.     Atlantic  Monthly,  November. 

1859. 

White's  Shakespeare.    Atlantic  Monthly,  January,  February. 
Longfellow's  "  The  Courtship  of  Miles  Standish."     Atlantic 

Monthly,  January. 

Holland's  "  Bitter-Sweet."     Atlantic  Monthly,  May. 
Allibone's    "Dictionary   of   Authors."      Atlantic   Monthly, 

June. 
Triibner's  "  Bibliographical  Guide  to  American  Literature." 

Atlantic  Monthly,  June. 
Notice  of  "  Index  to  Catalogue  of  Boston  City  Library." 

Atlantic  Monthly,  June. 
Notice   of    "  Memoir   of    Theophilus    Parsons."      Atlantic 

Monthly,  July. 

Dana's  «  To  Cuba  and  Back."     Atlantic  Monthly,  July. 
Palmer's  "  The  New  and  the  Old."     Atlantic  Monthly,  Sep 
tember. 

Copeland's   "  Country  Life."     Atlantic  Monthly,  September. 
Review  of  "  Dictionary  of  Americanisms,"  and  other  works 

on  Language.     Atlantic  Monthly,  November. 


436  APPENDIX 

Coolidge  and  Mansfield's  "  History  and  Description  of  New 

England."     Atlantic  Monthly,  November. 
Gould's  "  Reply  to  the    Statement  of  the  Trustees  of  the 

Dudley  Observatory."     Atlantic  Monthly,  November. 
Italy,  1859.     Atlantic  Monthly,  December. 
Notice  of  "  Forty-four  Years  of  the  Life  of  a  Hunter,  being 

Reminiscences  of  Meshach  Browning."   Atlantic  Monthly, 

December. 
Milburn's  "  Ten  Years  of  Preacher-Life."   Atlantic  Monthly, 

December. 
Notice  of  "A  First  Lesson  in  Natural  History."     Atlantic 

Monthly,  December. 
Dante.  Appleton's  New  American  Encyclopaedia.  Reprinted, 

May,  1886,  in  fifth  annual  report  of  the  Dante  Society. 

1860. 

Notice  of  "Sir  Rohan's  Ghost."  Atlantic  Monthly,  Feb 
ruary. 

To  the  Muse.     Atlantic  Monthly,  March. 

Marsh's  "Lectures  on  the  English  Language."  Atlantic 
Monthly,  April. 

Hawthorne's  "  The  Marble  Faun."   Atlantic  Monthly,  April. 

Notice  of  "  Poems  by  Two  Friends."  Atlantic  Monthly, 
April. 

Norton's  "  Notes  of  Travel  and  Study  in  Italy."  Atlantic 
Monthly,  May. 

Webster's  "  American  Dictionary  of  the  English  Language." 
Atlantic  Monthly,  May. 

Worcester's  "  A  Dictionary  of  the  English  Language."  At 
lantic  Monthly,  May. 

Coles's  "  Dies  Irse."     Atlantic  Monthly,  June. 

Collins's  "  A  Voyage  down  the  Amoor."  Atlantic  Monthly, 
June. 

Lowell's  "  Fresh  Hearts  that  failed  Three  Thousand  Years 
ago."  Atlantic  Monthly,  June. 

The  New  Tariff  Bill.     Atlantic  Monthly,  July. 

Wedgwood's  "  A  Dictionary  of  English  Etymology."  At 
lantic  Monthly,  August. 


APPENDIX  437 

Leslie's  "  Autobiographical  Recollections."  Atlantic  Month 
ly,  September. 

Trowbridge's  "  The  Old  Battle  Ground."  Atlantic  Monthly, 
September. 

July  reviewed  by  September  (with  W.  B.  Rogers).  Atlan 
tic  Monthly,  September. 

The  Election  in  November.     Atlantic  Monthly,  October. 

Mr.  Jarves's  Collection.     Atlantic  Monthly,  October. 

Olmsted's  "A  Journey  in  the  Back  County."  Atlantic 
Monthly,  November. 

Whittier's  "  Home  Ballads  and  Poems."  Atlantic  Monthly, 
November. 

A  Plea  for  Freedom  from  Speech  and  Figures  of  Speech 
Makers.  Atlantic  Monthly,  December. 

Bryant's  "  A  Forest  Hymn."     Atlantic  Monthly,  December. 

Stoddard's  "Loves  and  Heroines  of  the  Poets."  Atlantic 
Monthly,  December. 

Palmer's  "  Folk  Songs."     Atlantic  Monthly,  December. 

1861. 

The  Question  of  the  Hour.     Atlantic  Monthly,  January. 

Prior's  "  Ancient  Danish  Ballads."  Atlantic  Monthly,  Janu 
ary. 

Chambers's  "  Edinburgh  Papers."  Atlantic  Monthly,  Jan 
uary. 

Holland's  "  Miss  Gilbert's  Career."  Atlantic  Monthly,  Jan 
uary. 

E.  Pluribus  Unum.     Atlantic  Monthly,  February. 

Parton's  "Life  of  Andrew  Jackson."  Atlantic  Monthly, 
March. 

Rose  Terry's  "  Poems."     Atlantic  Monthly,  March. 

Holmes's  "  Elsie  Venner."     Atlantic  Monthly,  April. 

The  Pickens-and-Stealins'  Rebellion.  Atlantic  Monthly, 
June. 

Ode  to  Happiness.     Atlantic  Monthly,  September. 

The  Washers  of  the  Shroud.     Atlantic  Monthly,  November. 

Self- Possession  vs.  Prepossession.  Atlantic  Monthly,  Decem 
ber. 


438  APPENDIX 

1862. 

Birdofredum  Sawin,  Esq.,  to  Mr.  Hosea  Biglow,     Atlantic 

Monthly,  January,  March. 
Arnold's  "  On  Translating  Homer  "  and  Newman's  "  Homeric 

Translation  in  Theory  and  Practice."     Atlantic  Monthly, 

January. 
Mason   and  Slidell :    a    Yankee  Idyl.     Atlantic    Monthly, 

February. 
Miiller's  "  Lectures  on  the  Science  of  Language."     Atlantic 

Monthly,  March. 
A  Message  of  Jeff  Davis  in  Secret  Session.   Atlantic  Monthly, 

April. 
Speech  of  Honble  Preserved  Doe  in  Secret  Caucus.     Atlantic 

Monthly,  May. 
Sunthin'  in  the  Pastoral  Line.     Atlantic  Monthly,  June. 

1863. 

In  the  Half-  Way  House.     Atlantic  Monthly,  January. 

Latest  Views  of  Mr.  Biglow.     Atlantic  Monthly,  February. 

Russell's  "  My  Diary,  North  and  South."  Atlantic  Monthly, 
March. 

Story's  "  Roba  di  Roma."     Atlantic  Monthly,  April. 

Two  Scenes  from  the  Life  of  Blondel.  Atlantic  Monthly,  No 
vember. 

1864. 

Memorice  Positum  R.  G.  S.     Atlantic  Monthly,  January. 

The  President's  Policy.     North  American  Review,  January. 

Longfellow's  "Tales  of  a  Wayside  Inn."  North  Ameri 
can  Review,  January. 

Whittier's  "  In  War  Time."  North  American  Review,  Jan 
uary. 

Stedman's  "Alice  of  Monmouth."  North  American  Review, 
January. 

The  Black  Preacher.     Atlantic  Monthly,  April. 

McClellan's  Report.     North  American  Review,  April. 

Gurowski's  Diary.     North  American  Review,  April. 

Diplomatic  Correspondence.  North  American  Review,  April. 


APPENDIX  439 

Beecher's  Autobiography.     North  American  Keview,  April. 

Thackeray's  "  Roundabout  Papers."  North  American  Ke 
view,  April. 

Chaucer's  "  Legende  of  Goode  Women  "  and  "  Child's  Obser 
vations  on  the  Language  of  Chaucer.  North  American 
Review,  April. 

Jean  Ingelow's  Poems.     North  American  Review,  April. 

Barnes's  "  Poems  in  the  Dorset  Dialect."  North  American 
Review,  April. 

To  a  Friend  who  sent  me  a  Meerschaum.  Spirit  of  the  Fair, 
12  April. 

FIRESIDE  TRAVELS.  |  By  |  James  Russell  Lowell.  | 
"  Travelling  makes  a  man  sit  still  in  his  old  age  with  satisfac 
tion  and  travel  over  the  world  again  in  his  chair  and  bed  by 
discourse  and  thoughts" 

THE  VOYAGE  OP  ITALY,  BY  RICHARD  LASSELS,  GENT. 
Boston  :  |  Ticknor  and  Fields.  |  1864. 

The  Rebellion  :  its  Causes  and  Consequences.  North  Amer 
ican  Review,  July. 

Hazlitt's  "  Poems  of  Richard  Lovelace."  North  American 
Review,  July. 

The  Next  General  Election,  [afterward,  McClellan  or  Lin 
coln.]  North  American  Review,  October. 

1865. 

On  Board  the  '76.     Atlantic  Monthly,  January. 

Palfrey's  "History   of   New  England."      North   American 

Review,  January. 
Mr.  Hosea  Biglow  to  the  Editor  of  the  "  Atlantic  Monthly." 

Atlantic  Monthly,  April. 

Reconstruction.     North  American  Review,  April. 
Gold-Egg  :  a  Dream  Fantasy.     Atlantic  Monthly,  May. 
Scotch  the  Snake,  or  Kill  it.    North  American  Review,  July. 
Lord  Derby's  "  Translation  of  the  Iliad."     North  American 

Review,  July. 
Ode    Recited    at    the    Harvard    Commemoration.      Atlantic 

Monthly,  September. 
Thoreau's  "Letters."     North  American  Review,  October. 


440  APPENDIX 

Parkman's  "France  and  England."    North  American  Re 
view,  October. 

1866. 

What  Rabbi  Jehosha  said.     The  Nation,  18  January. 

A  Worthy  Ditty.     The  Nation,  25  January. 

Carlyle's  "Frederick  the  Great."    North  American  Review, 

April. 
The   President  on  the    Stump.     North  American   Review, 

April. 

Swinburne's  "  Tragedies."     North  American  Review,  April. 
Mr.  Worsley's  Nightmare.     The  Nation,  5  April. 
Mr.   Hosea   Biglow's   Speech   in  March  Meeting.      Atlantic 

Monthly,  May. 
To   J.    B.   on  sending  me  a    seven -pound   trout.     Atlantic 

Monthly,  July. 
At  the  Commencement  Dinner,  on  acknowledging  a  toast  to 

the  Smith  Professor,  19  July. 
The  Miner.     Atlantic  Monthly,  August. 
The  Seward-Johnson  Reaction.     North  American  Review, 

October. 
Wendell  Phillips  in  Congress.     The  Nation,  4  October. 

1867. 

Fitz  Adam's  Story.     Atlantic  Monthly,  January. 

Ward's  "  Life  and  Letters  of  Percival."     North  American 

Review,  January. 

Hob  Gobbling^  Song.     Our  Young  Folks,  January. 
A  Familiar  Epistle  to  a  Friend.     Atlantic  Monthly,  April. 
Lessing.     North  American  Review,  April. 
An  Ember  Picture.     Atlantic  Monthly,  July. 
Rousseau  and  the  Sentimentalists.   North  American  Review, 

July. 
Parkman's  "  France  and  England  in  North  America."   North 

American  Review,  July. 

Uncle  Cobus's  Story.     Our  Young  Folks,  July. 
The  Nightingale  in  the  Study.     Atlantic  Monthly,  September. 
The  Winthrop  Papers.     North  American  Review,  October. 
A  Great  Public  Character.     Atlantic  Monthly,  November. 


APPENDIX  441 

1868. 

In  the  Twilight.     Atlantic  Monthly,  January. 

Witchcraft.     North  American  Review,  January. 

Shakespeare  Once  More.     North  American  Review,  April. 

After  the  Burial.     Atlantic  Monthly,  May. 

A  June  Idyl.     Atlantic  Monthly,  June. 

Dryden.     North  American  Review,  July. 

The  Footpath.     Atlantic  Monthly,  August. 

"  Poems  of  John  James  Piatt."  North  American  Review, 
October. 

Mr.  Emerson's  New  Course  of  Lectures.  The  Nation,  12 
November. 

UNDER  THE  WILLOWS  \  AND  \  OTHER  POEMS.  By  |  James 
Russell  Lowell.  |  Boston  :  |  Fields,  Osgood  &  Co.,  |  Suc 
cessors  to  Ticknor  and  Fields.  |  1869. 

My  Garden  Acquaintance.     The  Atlantic  Almanac,  1869. 

1869. 

The  Flying  Dutchman.     Atlantic  Monthly,  January. 

On  a  Certain  Condescension  in  Foreigners.  Atlantic  Monthly, 
January. 

A  Look  before  and  after.  North  American  Review,  Janu 
ary. 

Bartlett's  "  Familiar  Quotations."  North  American  Review, 
July. 

A  Good  Word  for  Winter.     The  Atlantic  Almanac,  1870. 

1870. 

The  Cathedral.     Atlantic  Monthly,  January. 

THE  CATHEDRAL.  \  By  |  James  Russell  Lowell.  |  Bos 
ton  :  |  Fields,  Osgood  &  Co.  |  1870. 

Hazlitt's  "  Library  of  Old  Authors."  North  American  Re 
view,  April. 

AMONG  MY  BOOKS.  |  By  |  James  Russell  Lowell,  A.  M. 
|  Professor  of  Belles-Lettres  in  Harvard  College.  |  Bos 
ton  :  |  Fields,  Osgood  &  Co.  |  1870. 

Chaucer.     North  American  Review,  July. 


442  APPENDIX 

A  Virginian  in  New  England  Thirty-five  Years  Ago,  Intro 
duction  to.  Atlantic  Monthly,  August. 

1871. 

Pope.     North  American  Review,  January. 

Goodwin's  "  Plutarch's  Morals."  North  American  Review, 
April. 

MY  STUDY  WINDOWS.  |  By  |  James  Russell  Lowell,  A.  M. 
|  Professor  of  Belles-Lettres  in  Harvard  College.  |  Bos 
ton  :  |  James  R.  Osgood  and  Company.  |  Late  Ticknor  & 
Fields,  and  Fields,  Osgood  &  Co.  |  1871. 

1872. 

Masson's  "  Life  of  John  Milton."     North  American  Review, 

January. 
The  Shadow  of  Dante.     North  American  Review,  July. 

1874. 

Agassiz.     Atlantic  Monthly,  May. 
An  Epitaph.     The  Nation,  1  October. 
Jeffries  Wyman.     The  Nation,  8  October. 

1875. 

Spenser.     North  American  Review,  April. 

Sonnet  to  F.  A.     Atlantic  Monthly,  May. 

Ode  read   at  the    Concord    Centennial.      Atlantic   Monthly, 

June. 

Joseph  Winlock.     The  Nation,  17  June. 
James's  "  Sketches."     The  Nation,  24  June. 
Sonnets  from  over  Sea.     Atlantic  Monthly,  July. 
Under  the  Great  Elm.     Atlantic  Monthly,  August. 
The  World's  Fair,  1876.     The  Nation,  5  August. 
Tempora  Mutantur.     The  Nation,  26  August. 
The  Dancing  Bear.     Atlantic  Monthly,  September. 

1876. 

Forster's  "  Swift."     The  Nation,  13,  20  April. 
"The  Natural  History  and  Antiquities  of  Selborne."     The 
Nation,  27  April. 


APPENDIX  443 

A  Misconception.     The  Nation,  10  August. 

Campaign  Epigrams:    A  Coincidence  ;  Defrauding  Nature  ; 

The  Widow's  Mite.      The  Nation,  14  September. 
Campaign  Epigrams :  Moieties  ;  The  Astronomer  Misplaced. 

The  Nation,  12  October. 
AMONG  MY  BOOKS.  |  Second  Series.   |  By  |  James    Russell 

Lowell,  |  Professor  of  Belles-Lettres  in  Harvard  College.  | 

Boston  :  |  James  R.  Osgood  and  Company,  |  Late  Ticknor 

&  Fields,  and  Fields,  Osgood  &  Co.  j  1876. 
An   Ode  for  the  Fourth  of  July,  1876.     Atlantic  Monthly, 

December. 

1877. 

Birthday  Verses.     Atlantic  Monthly,  January. 

Bankside.     The  Nation,  31  May. 

Motley  (a  Note).     The  Nation,  7  June. 

THREE  MEMORIAL  POEMS.  \  By  |  James  Russell  Lowell.  | 

E?s  oiavbs    &piaTos   a.p.vveaQa.1  trfpl  irdrpr}S.  \  Boston  :  |  James 
R.  Osgood  and  Company,     Late  Ticknor  &  Fields,  and 
Fields,  Osgood  &  Co.  |  1877. 
Night  Watches.     Atlantic  Monthly,  July. 

1880. 

After  dinner  speech  at  Dejeuner  to  American  actors.     Re 
ported  in  The  Era,  London,  2  August. 

1881. 

Garfield.     Spoken  in  London,  24  September. 
Phoebe.     The  Century,  November. 

Stanley.     Speech  at  Chapter  House  of  Westminster  Abbey, 
13  December. 

1882. 
Estrangement.  The  Century,  May. 

1883. 
Fielding.  Address  at  Taunton,  England,  4  September. 


444  APPENDIX 

1884. 

Wordsworth.     Given  10  May. 

Democracy.  Delivered  at  Birmingham,  England,  6  Octo 
ber. 

1885. 

Coleridge.     Address  at  Westminster  Abbey,  7  May. 

An  after  dinner  speech  at  the  Celebration  of  Forefathers' 
Day  in  Plymouth.  21  December. 

Books  and  Libraries.  Address  at  Chelsea,  Massachusetts, 
22  December. 

Speech  as  presiding  officer  at  dinner  of  Massachusetts  Re 
form  League,  29  December.  Printed  in  Boston  Post,  30 
December. 

1886. 

International  Copyright.     The  Century,  February. 

Gray.     New  Princeton  Review,  March. 

Oration  in  Sanders  Theatre  on  the  Two  Hundred  and  Fiftieth 
Anniversary  of  the  Foundation  of  Harvard  University. 
Delivered  8  November. 

DEMOCRACY  |  AND  OTHER  ADDRESSES  |  by  |  James  Rus 
sell  Lowell  |  Boston  and  New  York  |  Houghton,  Mifflin 
&  Company  |  The  Riverside  Press,  Cambridge  |  1887 
[Copyright,  1886.] 

1887. 

Credidimus  Jovem  regnare.     Atlantic  Monthly,  February. 
Fancy  or  Fact  ?     Atlantic  Monthly,  March. 
Speech  at  Authors'  Reading,  28  November. 
The  Progress  of  the  World.     Introduction  to  "  The  World's 
Progress."     Gately  &  O'Gorman,  Boston. 

1888. 

The  Secret.     Atlantic  Monthly,  January. 
Endymion :  A  Mystical  Comment  on  Titian's   "  Sacred  and 

Profane  Love."     Atlantic  Monthly,  February. 
Some  Letters  of  Walter  Savage  Landor,  Introduction  to. 

The  Century,  February. 
The  Late  Mrs.  Ann  Benson  Procter.     The  Nation,  29  March, 


APPENDIX  445 

Turner's  Old  Temeraire :  under  a  Figure  symbolizing  the 
Church.  Atlantic  Monthly,  April. 

The  Place  of  the  Independent  in  Politics.  Address  deliv 
ered  before  the  Reform  Club  of  New  York,  13  April. 

POLITICAL  ESSAYS  |  By  |  James  Russell  Lowell  |  Boston 
and  New  York  |  Houghton,  Mifflin  and  Company  |  The 
Riverside  Press,  Cambridge  |  1888 

HEARTSEASE  AND  RUE  \  By  |  James  Russell  Lowell  |  Bos 
ton  and  New  York  |  Houghton,  Mifflin  and  Company  |  The 
Riverside  Press,  Cambridge  |  1888 

1889. 

"Our  Literature."     Response  to  a  toast,  on  the  hundredth 

Anniversary  of  Washington's  Inauguration,  30  April. 
How    I   consulted    the    Oracle   of  the    Goldfishes.      Atlantic 

Monthly,  August. 
Introduction  to  Walton's    "Angler,"   published   by   Little, 

Brown  &  Co. 
The   Study   of   Modern   Languages.      Address   before   the 

Modern  Language  Association  of  America. 

1890. 

The  Infant  Prodigy.  Signed  F.  de  T.  The  Nation,  1  May. 
In  a  Volume  of  Sir  Thomas  Browne.  Atlantic  Monthly,  July. 
Inscription  for  a  Memorial  Bust  of  Fielding.  Atlantic 

Monthly,  September. 
Introduction  to  Milton's  "  Areopagitica,"  published  by  the 

Grolier  Club. 
WRITINGS  OF  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL.     Riverside  Edition. 

10  volumes.     Boston  and   New  York  :  Houghton,  Mifflin 

&  Co. 

"  Thou  Spell,  avaunt  !  "    Atlantic  Monthly,  December. 
My  Brook.     New  York  Ledger,  13  December. 


446  APPENDIX 

POSTHUMOUS. 

1891. 

LATEST  LITERARY  ESSAYS  |  AND  ADDRESSES  |  OF  JAMES 
RUSSELL  LOWELL  |  Boston  and  New  York  |  Houghton, 
Mifflin  &  Company  |  [1892  |  Copyright,  1891.] 

His  Ship.     Harper^s  Monthly,  December. 

Shakespeare's  Richard  III.  Atlantic  Monthly,  December. 
(Read  first  before  \he  Edinburgh  Philosophical  Institution, 

in  1883.) 

1892. 

On  a  Bust  of  General  Grant.     Scribner's  Magazine,  March. 

The  Old  English  Dramatists.     Harper's  Monthly,  June. 

Marlowe.     Harper's  Monthly,  July. 

Webster.     Harper's  Monthly,  August. 

Beaumont  and  Fletcher.     Harper's  Monthly,  October. 

Massinger  and  Ford.     Harper's  Monthly,  November. 

THE  |  OLD  ENGLISH  DRAMATISTS  |  By  |  James  Russell 
Lowell  |  Boston  and  New  York  |  Houghton,  Mifflin  and 
Company  |  The  Riverside  Press,  Cambridge  |  1892 

Parkman.     The  Century,  November. 

1893. 

LETTERS  OF  |  JAMES  RUSSELL  LOWELL  |  Edited  by  Charles 
Eliot  Norton  |  New  York  |  Harper  &  Brothers  Publish 
ers  |  1894  [In  two  volumes.] 

Humor,  Wit,  Fun  and  Satire.     The  Century,  November. 

The  Five  Indispensable  Authors  [Homer,  Dante,  Cervantes, 
Goethe,  Shakspere].  The  Century,  December. 

1894. 

The  Function  of  the  Poet.     The  Century,  January. 

Criticism  and  Culture.     The  Century,  February. 

The  Imagination.     The  Century,  March. 

Unpublished  Fragments  from  College  Lectures  :  i.  The  Study 
of  Literature  ;  ii.  Translation ;  iii.  Originality  and  Tradi 
tion  in  Literature  ;  iv.  Choice  in  Reading  ;  v.  The  Search 
for  Truth  ;  vi.  Close  of  Lectures  at  Cornell  University; 


APPENDIX  447 

vii.  Elements  of  the  English  Language  ;  viii.  The  Poetic 
and  the  Actual  ;  ix.  Poetry  in  Homely  Lines  ;  x.  Style  ; 
xi.  Piers  Ploughman  ;  xii.  Montaigne  ;  xiii.  The  Humor 
ous  and  the  Comic  ;  xiv.  First  Need  of  American  Culture. 
The  Harvard  Crimson,  23  Marcher  May. 

Fragments  :  i.  Life  in  Literature  and  Language  ;  ii.  Style 
and  Manner  ;  iii.  Kalevala  [with  translation].  The  Cen 
tury,  May. 

Lowell's  Letters  to  Poe.     Scribner's  Magazine,  August. 

1895. 

LAST  POEMS  \  of  |  James  Russell  Lowell  |  Boston  and  New 
York  |  Houghton,  Mifflin  and  Company  |  The  Riverside 
Press,  Cambridge  |  MDCCCXCV 

1896. 

THE  POWER  OF  \  SOUND  \  a  Rhymed  |  Lecture  by  James 
Russell  Lowell  |  Privately  |  Printed  |  New  York  | 
MDCCCXCVI 

1897. 

LECTURES  |  ON  |  ENGLISH  POETS  |  By  |  James  Russell 
Lowell  | 

—  "  Call  up  him  who  left  half-told 
The  story  of  Cambuscan  bold 

Cleveland  |  The  Rowfant  Club  |  MDCCCXCVII 
1899. 

IMPRESSIONS  OF  |  SPAIN  |  James  Russell  Lowell  |  Com 
piled  by  |  Joseph  B.  Gilder  |  with  an  introduction  by 
A.  A.  Adee  |  Boston  and  New  York  |  Houghton,  Mifflin 
and  Company  |  The  Riverside  Press  |  1899 

Verses  written  in  a  copy  of  Shakspere.  The  Century,  No 
vember. 

1900. 

Verses :  i.  Written  in  a  gift  copy  of  Mr.  Lowell's  Poems  ; 
ii.  Written  in  a  copy  of  "  Among  my  Books  ; "  iii.  Writ 
ten  in  a  copy  of  "  Fireside  Travels."  Atlantic  Monthly, 
December. 


D.  THE  LOWELL  MEMORIAL  IN  WESTMINSTER 
ABBEY 

From  the  London  Times,  Wednesday,  29  November, 
1893 

MB.  LESLIE  STEPHEN  yesterday  unveiled  the  memo 
rial  which  has  been  placed  in  honor  of  the  late  James 
Russell  Lowell  at  the  entrance  to  the  Chapter-house, 
Westminster  Abbey.  The  memorial  includes  a  window 
and  a  bust  underneath,  which  is  said  to  be  an  admirable 
likeness  of  the  late  American  Minister.  The  window 
has  been  erected  by  Messrs.  Clayton  and  Bell,  and  con 
sists  of  three  lights.  In  the  centre  is  the  figure  of  Sir 
Launfal,  from  Lowell's  poem  of  that  name,  below  is  an 
angel  with  the  Holy  Grail,  and  in  the  lowest  compart 
ment  the  incident  of  Sir  Launfal  and  the  leper  is  repre 
sented.  The  right  light  has  the  figure  of  St.  Botolph, 
the  patron  saint  of  the  church  of  Boston,  Lincolnshire, 
from  which  the  Massachusetts  city,  Lowell's  birthplace, 
derived  its  name  ;  below  is  the  landing  of  the  Pilgrim 
Fathers.  The  light  on  the  left  contains  the  figure  of 
St.  Ambrose,  one  of  the  reputed  authors  of  Te  Deum 
Laudamus  ;  below  is  a  group  representing  the  eman 
cipation  of  slaves.  In  trefoils  above  the  side-lights  are 
shields  bearing  the  arms  of  the  United  States  and  the 
United  Kingdom. 

Mr.  A.  J.  Balfour  was  asked  to  take  the  chief  part  in 
yesterday's  ceremony,  but  was  prevented  by  illness  from 
attending. 

The  Dean  of  Westminster  presided,  and  the  Chapter- 


APPENDIX  449 

house  was  filled  with  a  numerous  audience.  Among 
those  who  had  been  invited,  and  the  greater  number  of 
whom  were  present,  were  the  Lord  Chancellor  and  Lady 
Herschell,  the  Duke  and  Duchess  of  Argyll,  the  Speaker 
of  the  House  of  Commons,  the  Earl  of  Rosebery,  Lord 
Knutsford,  the  Dowager  Countess  of  Derby,  the  Earl 
and  Countess  of  Pembroke,  Lady  Arthur  Russell,  Lord 
and  Lady  Coleridge,  Lord  and  Lady  Reay,  Lord  Aber- 
dare,  the  Earl  and  Countess  Brownlow,  Lord  and  Lady 
R.  Churchill,  Adeline  Duchess  of  Bedford,  Lord  and 
Lady  Playfair,  the  Countess  of  Ashburton,  Mr.  J. 
Chamberlain,  M.  P.,  and  Mrs.  Chamberlain,  Mr.  Shaw 
Lefevre,  M.  P.,  the  diplomatic  representatives  of  Amer 
ica,  Italy,  Greece,  Russia,  Spain,  Denmark,  Germany, 
and  France,  Judge  Hughes,  Professor  Huxley,  Arch 
deacon  Farrar,  Sir  Henry  James,  M.  P.,  Sir  J.  Hassard, 
representing  the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  Mr.  Rath- 
bone,  M.  P.,  General  and  Mrs.  Clive,  Miss  Balfour,  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Gosse,  Mrs.  Lynn  Linton,  Mr.  Spencer  Lyt- 
telton,  Dr.  Martineau,  Mrs.  Richmond  Ritchie,  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Smalley,  Mr.  W.  Besant,  Miss  Bradley,  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  Darwin,  Mrs.  A.  Murray  Smith,  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Birrell,  Mr.  F.  W.  Gibbs,  Mr.  Austin  Dobson,  Mr. 
George  Meredith,  Mrs.  Humphry  Ward,  Mr,  Dykes 
Campbell,  Mr.  G.  Du  Maurier,  and  Mrs.  Matthew  Ar 
nold.  Sir  William  Harcourt  was  unavoidably  prevented 
from  attending  by  Ministerial  business. 

The  Dean  of  Westminster  said  that  he  had  been 
asked  to  take  the  chair  on  this  interesting  and  sugges 
tive  occasion.  They  had  met  in  that  venerable  and 
stately  building  to  pay  some  tribute  to  the  memory  of 
one  who,  from  the  first  day  which  he  spent  in  this  coun 
try  up  to  the  date  of  his  death,  had  endeared  himself 
to  an  ever-widening  circle  of  friends,  and  who  had  for 


450  APPENDIX 

many  years  been  the  representative  in  the  Queen's  do 
minions  of  that  great  Republic  of  the  West.  He  would 
leave  it  to  others  to  speak  of  Mr.  Lowell's  great  quali^ 
ties,  and  of  the  position  which  he  held  as  a  poet,  a 
humorist,  and  essayist.  Mr.  Lowell  was  worthy  to  be 
reckoned  among  the  great  writers  of  our  tongue  — 
Chaucer,  Shakespeare,  Spenser,  Milton,  Dryden,  and 
those  poets  whom  we  had  so  lately  lost.  They  all 
deeply  regretted  the  absence  of  Mr.  Balfour  and  its 
cause,  but  they  gratefully  recognized  the  service  which 
Mr.  Leslie  Stephen  was  rendering  them  by  his  presence. 
There  was  no  one  to  whom  the  task  of  speaking  of  Mr. 
Lowell  could  so  wisely  be  entrusted.  In  the  presence  of 
the  American  Ambassador  he  might,  perhaps,  be  allowed 
to  speak  of  the  special  fitness  of  the  place  in  which  they 
were  assembled  —  which  was  a  part  of  the  ancient 
Abbey,  the  very  heart  and  centre  of  that  Benedictine 
monastery,  and  used  solely  as  the  daily  meeting-place 
of  the  monks.  There  was  no  spot  in  the  kingdom  or  in 
the  world  which  could  compare  in  historic  interest  and 
significance  with  that  in  which  they  were  met.  That 
part  of  the  Abbey  with  which  so  many  associations  had 
gathered,  and  which  was  now  known  by  the  name  of 
Poets'  Corner,  dated  from  the  period  of  the  commence 
ment  of  the  House  of  Commons,  whose  members  in  the 
earliest  days  and  for  three  centuries  of  its  existence 
were  summoned  within  the  walls  of  the  Chapter-house. 
Thus  the  room  where  they  were  sitting  was  not  only  the 
meeting-place  of  the  Benedictine  monks  of  Westminster, 
but  it  was  also  for  a  long  period  the  ordinary  meeting- 
place  of  the  Commons  of  England.  After  the  dissolu 
tion  of  the  monasteries,  the  Chapter-house  was  vested  in 
the  Crown,  and  was  still  so  vested,  and  it  was  by  the 
permission  of  the  First  Commissioner  of  Works  that  the 


APPENDIX  451 

present  meeting  to  do  honor  to  a  great  American  was 
held.  For  three  more  centuries  after  the  Commons  had 
ceased  to  be  summoned  to  the  Chapter-house,  the  house 
was  used,  he  would  not  say  as  a  lumber-room,  but  as  a 
record-room  in  which  were  stored  the  invaluable  docu 
ments  which  belonged  to  the  House  of  Commons  and 
the  various  Government  offices.  One  deficiency,  how 
ever,  long  remained,  which  his  dear  and  illustrious  pre 
decessor  long  tried  to  remove.  The  late  Dean  en 
deavored  to  induce  successive  Governments  to  fill  the 
windows  with  stained  glass,  but  without  success.  After 
his  death,  however,  one  of  the  windows  was  filled.  No 
meeting  could  have  been  more  representative  of  the 
whole  English-speaking  race  than  the  one  which  was 
held  when  that  window  was  unveiled.  He  could  im 
agine  that  he  was  still  hearing  the  words  which  fell 
from  Mr.  Lowell  on  that  occasion,  Si  monumentum 
quceris,  circumspice.  No  words  could  have  been  more 
eloquent  or  impressive  than  those  used  by  the  American 
Minister  of  that  day.  That  was  the  first  time  he  him 
self  had  the  pleasure  of  hearing  Mr.  Lowell's  voice. 
The  next  historic  meeting  in  that  room  was  one  called 
to  unveil  a  painted  window,  the  gift  of  the  Queen,  which 
was  inserted  in  memory  of  Lady  Augusta  Stanley. 
That  meeting,  also,  Mr.  Lowell  attended.  Two  years 
afterwards  he  had  had  the  privilege,  in  his  capacity  of 
Dean,  of  summoning  a  meeting  with  a  view  to  honor 
the  American  poet  Longfellow,  to  whom  a  memorial 
stood  in  Poets'  Corner.  A  fourth  meeting  was  held  in 
memory  of  one  to  whom  as  poet  and  thinker  the  older 
generation  owed  so  much.  It  had  been  his  privilege  to 
place  a  bust  in  memory  of  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge. 
Mr.  Lowell  on  that  occasion  made  one  of  the  most  sym 
pathetic  and  appreciative  speeches  to  which  he  had  ever 


452  APPENDIX 

listened.  They  would  all  agree  that  no  more  suitable 
spot  could  be  chosen  on  which  to  perpetuate  the  memory 
of  one  who  was  not  only  for  many  years  the  representa 
tive  in  this  country  of  the  great  American  Republic,  but 
was  so  great  an  ornament  to  that  language  and  litera 
ture  which  were  the  common  heritage  of  Americans  and 
Englishmen  alike. 

Speeches  were  made  also  by  Mr.  Leslie  Stephen,  Mr. 
J.  Chamberlain,  M.  P.,  and  Mr.  Bayard,  the  American 
Ambassador. 


INDEX 


[Titles  of  periodicals,  and  of  books,  articles,  and  poems  by  J.  R.  L.,  are 
printed  in  Italic  type.] 


Abolitionists,  scored  by  J.  R.  L.  in 
Class  Poem,  i.  56 ;  J.  R.  L.  identi 
fies  himself  with,  191,  197;  inde 
pendence  of,  in  1848,  213 ;  separated 
from,  ii.  16. 

Adams,  John,  J.  R.  L.  remembers 
hearing  of  the  death  of,  i.  19. 

Adee,  Alvin  A.,  on  J.  R.  L.'s  insight 
into  Spanish  character,  ii.  244. 

Adirondack  Club,  formed  by  W.  J. 
Stillman,  i.  404;  its  membership, 
405. 

"Adirondacs,  The,"  by  R.  W.  Emer 
son,  i.  404  ;  ii.  175. 

"  Africa,"  by  M.  W.  L.,  i.  369. 

African  coast,  approach  to,  i.  313. 

Agassiz,  i.  400  ;  compared  with  other 
poems,  ii.  175  ;  the  portraits  in,  176  ; 
J.  R.  L.  on,  177,  178 ;  the.  patriotic 
feeling  in,  190. 

Agassiz,  Louis,  a  member  of  the  Adi 
rondack  Club,  i.  405;  death  of,  ii. 
174. 

Aladdin,  taken  from  Our  Own,  i.  353. 

Alcott,  Amos  Bronson,  characterized 
in  A  Fable  for  Critics,  i.  240. 

Aldrich,  Thomas  Bailey,  a  tenant  of 
Elmwood,  i.  1 ;  J.  R.  L.  thanks  him 
for  his  praise  of  Under  the  Willows, 
125  ;  takes  possession  of  Elmwood, 
150  ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  a  doctorate,  169  ; 
leaves  Elmwood,  185 ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on 
fleeing  to  the  mountains,  186  ;  J.  R. 
L.  to,  on  contributions  to  the  At 
lantic,  297,  388. 

Alfonso,  king  of  Spain,  J.  R.  L.  pre 
sents  him  with  the  President's  con 
gratulations,  ii.  224 ;  J.  R.  L.  is 
presented  to,  227  ;  his  marriage  de 
scribed,  230. 

Al  Fresco,  i.  269  ;  ii.  41. 


Allen,  Alexander  Viets  Griswold,  ii. 
69,  note. 

Ambrose,  i.  228. 

American  Academy  of  Arts  and  Sci 
ences,  J.  R.  L.'s  membership  in,  i. 
446,  note. 

American  Archaeological  Institute,  ii. 
326. 

"  American  Conflict,  The,"  by  Horace 
Greeley,  reviewed  by  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  53. 

American  Literature,  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii. 
361-368. 

American  Politics,  the  address  J.  R.  L. 
did  not  give,  ii.  351. 

American  Review,  The,  Poe's  "Ra 
ven  "  published  in,  i.  163. 

Among  My  Books,  first  series,  pub 
lished,  ii.  144  ;  second  series,  196. 

Anderson,  Major  Robert,  ii.  25. 

Another  Rallying  Cry  by  a  Yankee,  i. 
168. 

Antwerp,  ii.  170. 

"  A  pair  of  black  eyes,"  poem  begin 
ning,  i.  54. 

Appleton,  Thomas,  goes  to  hear  J.  R. 
L.  lecture,  i.  373. 

Appleton's  Journal,  edited  by  R.  Car 
ter,  ii.  144. 

Arcturus,  a  literary  journal,  i.  95. 

"Areopagitica,"  Milton's,  J.  R.  L. 
writes  an  introduction  to,  ii.  398. 

"Are  we  Christians?"  J.  R.  L.  on, 
ii.  165. 

Art,  J.  R.  L.'s  relations  to,  ii.  86. 

"  Atalanta  in  Calydon,"  ii.  92. 

Athenaeum,  The,  quoted,  ii.  293. 

Atlantic  Club,  The,  i.  447. 

Atlantic  Monthly,  origin  of,  i.  408-413; 
its  value  to  Whittier,  417  ;  its  sale, 
418  ;  its  timeliness,  419  ;  its  anony 
mous  character,  422;  policy  of,  as 


454 


INDEX 


affirmed  by  J.  R.  L.,  424 ;  interest  of 
the  public  in,  425  ;  its  freedom  from 
competition,  427  ;  reviewing  in, 
430  ;  clubs  that  sprang  from,  446 ; 
designed  to  be  a  political  magazine, 
ii.  1  ;  compared  with  Standard,  3  ; 
J.  R.  L.'s  political  articles  in,  17  ; 
the  second  series  of  Biglow  Papers 
asked  for  by  editor  of,  35  ;  an  anony 
mous  writer  in,  describes  J.  R.  L.'s 
comments  on  the  Jews,  301. 

Auf  Wiedersehen,  i.  368. 

"  Auld  Lang  Syne,"  by  Max  Miiller, 
quoted,  ii.  263. 

Authors'  readings,  ii.  333  ;  address  by 
J.  R.  L.  before,  361. 

"  Autobiography  of  a  Journalist"  re 
ferred  to,  i.  404. 

"Autocrat,  The,  of  the  Breakfast 
Table,"  i.  426. 

Azeglio,  Massimo  d',  i.  395. 

Bachi,  Pietro,  instructor  in  Italian, 
Spanish,  and  Portuguese  at  Harvard 
in  J.  R.  L.'s  youth,  i.  27. 

Ballads  in  J.  R.  L.'s  early  years,  i.  12. 

"  Band,  The,"  i.  89. 

Banks,  Nathaniel  Prentiss,  J.  R.  L. 
comments  on,  ii.  194. 

Barlow,  Joel,  ii.  361. 

Barrett,  Elizabeth  Barrett,  afterward 
Mrs.  Browning,  contributes  to  the 
Pioneer,  i.  Ill ;  reviewed  by  Poe, 
165. 

Bartlett,  John,  friend  of  J.  R.  L.,  and 
member  with  him  of  whist  club,  i. 
271 ;  verses  to,  by  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  96 
calls  the  whist  club  together  for  the 
last  time,  407. 

Bartol,  Rev.  Cyrus  Augustus,  col 
league  of  Charles  Lowell,  discour 
ages  the  publication  of  his  sermons, 
i.  8,  note  ;  C.  L.'s  attitude  toward 
as  regards  salary,  234,  note. 

Beaver  Brook,  J.  R.  L.'s  early  rambles 
to,  i.  19. 

Beaver  Brook,  i.  228,  232. 

Bell,  Mrs.  Helen  Choate,  J.  R.  L.  to 
on  Feltham,  ii.  359. 

Bell  telephone,  ii.  328. 

Benton,  Joel,  defends  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  192 
and  draws  out  a  letter  in  response 
193. 

BeYanger,  J.  R.  L.  translates  Sainte- 
Beuve's  article  on,  ii.  77. 


Bernini,  the  angels  of,  i.  319. 
Bethune,  Rev.  George  Washington,  L 

155. 
Beverly,  J.  R.  L.  describes  life  at,  L 

365,  366. 

Bibliolatres,  i.  228. 

Biglow,  Hosea,  J.  R.  L.  regrets  mak 
ing  him  a  bad  speller,  i.  261  ;  thinks 
of  educating  him,  261. 
Biglow  Papers,  first  series,  quoted,  i. 
21  ;  begun  in  Boston  Courier,  201 ; 
published  also  in  the  Standard,  256;- 
origin  of,  in  J.  R.  L.'s  mind,  257  ;• 
their  success  referred  to  by  J.  R.  L., 
260  ;  progenitors  of,  261 ;  bad  spell 
ing  in,  261  ;  revised  for  publication, 
261,  262  ;  the  apparatus  of,  263 ; 
success  of,  264  ;  expressive  of  New 
England,  265  ;  and  of  Lowell,  265  ; 
eclipsing  A  Fable  for  Critics,  266  ; 
relation  of,  to  SirLaunfal,  268  ;  sec 
ond  series,  400;  not  liked  by  Mrs. 
Lowell,  428 y  introduced  by  Hughes 
in  England,*  454 ;  demand  for  more, 
ii.  32 ;  first  of  second  series  written, 
34;  second  series  compared  with 
first,  36  ;  quoted  in  newspapers  af 
ter  the  Spanish  war,  94  ;  Introduc 
tion  to  second  series,  102. 
Birmingham  and  Midland  Institute, 

address  before,  ii.  313. 
Black,  Charles  C.,  a  friend  of  J.  R.  L. 
in  Italy,  i.  317  ;  helps  him  to  Lon 
don  papers,   320  ;   gets  up  private 
theatricals,  331. 

Blackwood's  Magazine,  reputation  of, 
in  America,  i.  419  ;  model  of  the 
Atlantic,  421. 

Elaine,  James  Gillespie,   J.  R.  L.  re 
joices   over  the  defeat  of,  ii.  204  ; 
corresponds    with    J.   R.   L.   when 
Secretary  of  State,  285 ;  is  succeeded 
by  Mr.   Frelinghuysen,  290,   note  ; 
had  chosen  successor  to  J.  R.  L.  in 
anticipation  of  election  to  the  pre 
sidency,   317  ;    divides    the    Union 
League  Club  in  Chicago,  352. 
Blarney  Castle,  J.  R.  L.  visits,  ii.  152. 
Bliss,  Edward  Penniman,  ii.  202,  note. 
Blondel,  a  prototype  of  Lincoln,  ii.  43. 
Bologna,  J.  R.  L.  receives  degree  at» 

ii.  379. 
Books  and  Libraries  quoted,  i.  30 ;  iL 

326. 
Boott,  Francis,  i.  318. 


INDEX 


455 


Bores,  passage  on,  in  A  Fable  for 
Critics,  i.  246. 

Boston  Courier,  J.  R.  L.  contributes 
to,  i.  168,  174. 

Boston  Daily  Advertiser,  J.  R.  L.'s 
lecture  reported  in,  i.  373  ;  on  Com 
memoration  Ode,  ii.  64. 

Boston  Miscellany,  The,  a  literary 
journal,  i.  98  ;  J.  R.  L.'s  contribu 
tions  to,  98,  99 ;  is  merged  in  Arc- 
turns,  99. 

Boswell's  Johnson  frequently  read  by 
J.  R.  L.,  ii.  407. 

Bowen,  Francis,  controversy  of,  with 
Mrs.  Putnam,  i.  304. 

Bowker,  Richard  Rogers,  gives  an 
account  of  the  Lowells  in  London, 
ii.  267  ;  on  J.  R.  L.'s  perplexities  in 
presenting  ladies  at  court,  298. 

Boyle,  Miss  Mary,  entrusts  Landor's 
letters  to  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  342. 

Brackett,  Dr.,  of  Portsmouth,  i.  19. 

Bradburn,  George,  projects  a  maga 
zine,  i.  287. 

"  Brahma,"  by  Emerson,  the  quid 
nuncs  on,  i.  415  ;  J.  R.  L.  on,  415, 
416. 

Brattle,  Thomas,  i.  2. 

Bremer,  Fredrika,  describes  the  Low 
ell  household,  i.  298. 

Brewster,  Sir  David,  a  teacher  of 
Charles  Lowell,  i.  7. 

Briggs,  Charles  Frederick  (Harry 
Franco),  i.  110  ;  J.  R.  L.  makes  the 
acquaintance  of,  114  ;  criticises  A 
Legend  of  Brittany,  120  ;  letter  to, 
from  M.  W.,  129;  projects  Broad 
way  Chronicle,  130  ;  condemns  cus 
tomary  marriage  ceremonies,  131, 
note ;  starts  the  Broadway  Journal, 
156 ;  seeks  contributions  from  J.  R. 
L.  and  M.  W.  L.,  156 ;  offers  to  make 
a  contract  with  J.  R.  L.,  157  ;  upon 
compensation,  158  ;  objects  to  J.  R. 
L.'s  first  article,  159;  abandons  his 
paper,  160  ;  corresponds  with  J.  R. 
L.  regarding  Poe,  163-166 ;  receives 
a  visit  from  J.  R.  L.  and  M.  W.  L., 
173  ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  his  anticipated 
child,  179 ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  after  the 
birth  of  Blanche,  181  ;  is  amused 
over  J.  R.  L.'s  French  exercise,  182, 
and  note ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  Anti- 
Slavery,  183  ;  and  on  the  training  of 
Blanche,  185  ;  is  notified  of  A  Fable 


for  Critics,  238 ;  asks  after  it,  239  ; 
has  it  offered  to  him  as  a  New  Year's 
gift,  240  ;  accepts  it,  and  proposes 
distribution  of  profits,  242  ;  writes 
J.  R.  L.  to  retain  passage  on  Miss 
Fuller,  245;  does  not  like  Bryant, 
245 ;  hears  of  Sir  Launfal,  266 ; 
comments  on  The  Changeling,  279  ; 
writes  to  J.  R.  L.  of  Willis  and  Mrs. 
Clemm,  282 ;  begs  J.  R.  L.  not  to 
undertake  editorship,  287  ;  J.  R.  L. 
writes  to  him  of  The  Nooning,  300 ; 
is  editor  of  Putnam's  Monthly,  348 ; 
looks  to  J.  R.  L.  for  contributions, 
350 ;  receives  Our  Own,  351 ;  J.  R. 
L.  to,  on  magazine  popularity,  352; 
on  Cambridge  Thirty  Years  Ago, 
354  ;  prints  M.  W.  L.'s  verses,  358; 
J.  R.  L.  to,  on  the  death  of  M.  W. 
L.,  360  ;  on  his  own  appointment  at 
Harvard,  376. 

Bright,  Henry,  sends  grouse  to  Long 
fellow,  i.  346. 

Bright,  John,  J.  R.  L.  essays  to  write 
a  paper  on,  ii.  388. 

Bristol,  J.  R.  L.  visits,  ii.  157. 

Bristow,  Benjamin  H.,  a  candidate 
for  the  presidency,  ii.  203. 

British  Poets,  J.  R.  L.  helps  edit  the, 
i.  364  ;  ii.  101. 

Broadway  Chronicle,  The,  projected 
by  C.  F.  Briggs,  i.  130. 

Broadway  Journal,  The,  edited  by  C. 
F.  Briggs,  i.  154 ;  J.  R.  L.  and  M. 
W.  L.  contribute  to,  156,  158-160  ; 
is  discontinued,  160. 

Brook,  The,  ii.  393. 

Brooks,  Phillips,  makes  prayer  at  H?r- 
vard  Commemoration,  ii.  69. 

Brown,  Charles  Brockden,  ii.  364. 

Browning,  Robert,  poems  of,  reviewed 
by  J.  R.  L.,  i.  290,  291  ;  met  by  J.  R. 
L.,  381  ;  his  dramas  to  be  read,  not 
seen,  ii.  70  ;  met  by  J.  R.  L.  in  Ven 
ice,  272. 

Bruges,  ii.  170. 

Bryant,  William  Cullen,  in  A  Fable 
for  Critics,  i.  245;  criticises  J.  R.  L., 
245,  note ;  J.  R.  L.  uneasy  over  his 
judgment  on,  253  ;  A  New  Englander 
in  New  York,  420;  his  "Water 
fowl,"  ii.  365. 

Buchanan,  James,  criticised  by  Parke 
Godwin  in  the  Atlantic,  ii.  3;  and  by 
J.  R.  L.,  4,  6,  7,  11,  12,  21. 


456 


INDEX 


Buckingham,  J.  T.,  editor  of  Boston 
Courier,  J.  R.  L.  addresses,  i.  174  ; 
a  hater  of  slavery,  175. 

Bulfinch,  Charles,  architectural  works 
of,  i.  26. 

Bull-fight,  J.  R.  L.  witnesses  a,  ii.  234. 

Burke,  Edmund,  ii.  362. 

Burleigh,  C.  C.,  editor  of  Pennsylva 
nia  Freeman,  i.  152. 

Burnett,  Edward,  marries  Mabel  Low 
ell,  ii.  150;  entertains  J.  R.  L.  in 
Washington,  387. 

Burnett,  Mabel  Lowell,  see  Lowell, 
Mabel ;  edits  Donne  with  Mr.  Nor 
ton,  ii.  102,  note  ;  makes  J.  R.  L. 
a  grandfather,  166  ;  meets  J.  R.  L. 
on  his  return  from  Europe,  185  ;  J. 
R.  L.  writes  to  her  of  Mrs.  Lowell's 
illness,  253  ;  and  of  his  transfer  to 
England,  255  ;  with  her  husband 
visits  England,  258 ;  makes  a  home 
for  J.  R.  L.  in  his  last  days,  393. 

Butler,  Benjamin  Franklin,  J.  R.  L. 
comments  on,  ii.  194 ;  a  byblow  of 
Democracy,  324. 

Byron,  his ' '  English  Bards  and  Scotch 
Reviewers,"  i.  250,  note;  his  "  muddy 
stuff,"  337,  338. 

Cabot,  Arthur,  buys  Elmwood,  i.  5. 

Cabot,  James  Elliot,  i.  411 ;  his  "Life 
of  Emerson,"  ii.  366. 

Caesar,  J.  R.  L.  offers  a  new  paragraph 
to  his  Commentaries,  ii.  383. 

Calderon,  i.  269. 

Calhoun,  John  Caldwell,  satirized  by 
J.  R.  L.,  i.  215-218. 

California,  J.  R.  L.  on  discovery  of 
gold  in,  i.  177. 

Cambridge,  England,  J.  R.  L.  visits, 
to  receive  a  degree,  ii.  184. 

Cambridge,  Massachusetts,  the  birth 
place  of  J.  R.  L.,  i.  1 ;  its  character 
as  a  college  town,  25  ;  its  connection 
with  Boston  in  J.  R.  L.'s  boyhood,  26. 

Cambridge  Thirty  Years  Ago,  ad 
dressed  to  W.  W.  Story,  i.  22  ;  pub 
lished  in  Putnam's  Monthly,  353. 

Campagna,  the,  J.  R.  L.'s  first  view 
of,  i.  318  ;  his  walks  in,  322,  328,  338. 

Canovas  del  Castillo,  J.  R.  L.  com 
ments  on,  ii.  233,  244,  246  ;  views 
of,  on  Cuba,  254. 

Carlisle,  ii.  156. 

Carlyle,  Thomas,  satirized  by  J.  R.  L. 


in  his  Class  Poem,  i.  57;  in  the  ap 
paratus  of  Biglow  Papers,  263; 
paper  on,  by  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  89;  modi 
fication  of  judgment  concerning,  90  ; 
assessed,  91. 

Carman,  Bliss,  ii.  389. 

Carter,  Robert,  associated  with  J.  R. 

.  L.  in  the  Pioneer,  i.  99  ;  his  career, 
100,  101  ;  writes  a  card  explaining 
J.  R.  L.'s  silence,  107  ;  letters  of  J. 
R.  L.  to,  from  New  York,  109-114 ; 
letter  of  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  going  to 
Philadelphia,  152-155  ;  J.  R.  L. 
writes  to,  in  Pepperell,  274 ;  writes 
on  the  Hungarian  question,  304;  let 
ter  to,  from  J.  R.  L.  at  Terracina, 
343 ;  reports  J.  R.  L.'s  lecture  be 
fore  Lowell  Institute,  373  ;  asks  J. 
R.  L.  to  write  for  Appletons'1  Jour 
nal,  ii.  144;  interests  himself  in  J. 
R.  L.'s  political  preferment,  202 ; 
wishes  to  print  the  Fourth  of  July 
ode,  203. 

Cass,  Lewis,  satirized  by  J.  R.  L.,  i. 
215-217. 

Castellar  y  Rissoll,  Emilio,  ii.  244. 

Cathedral,  The,  quoted,  i.  17,  18,  380; 
composition  of,  ii.  139  ;  first  called 
A  Day  at  Chartres,  140^  the  pleasure 
it  gave  J.  R.  L.,  142. 

Caucus,  speech  of  J.  R.  L.  at,  ii.  206- 
211. 

"  Centurion,  The,"  in  A  Fable  for 
Critics,  i.  242. 

Century  Magazine,  The,  on  Lincoln 
and  Lowell,  ii.  71;  interested  in  in 
ternational  copyright,  333. 

Certain  Condescension  in  Foreigners, 
A,ii.  122,262. 

Chace,  Senator,  of  Rhode  Island,  ii. 
326. 

Chamounix,  ii.  171. 

Changeling,  The,  i.  274  ;  praised  by 
Briggs,  279. 

Channing,  Edward  Tyrrel,  i.  36. 

Channing,  William  Ellery,  ii.  364. 

Channing,  William  Francis,  contribu 
tor  to  the  Standard,  i.  193. 

Chapman,  George,  ii.  354. 

Chapman,  Mrs.  Maria  Weston,  man 
ages  bazaar,  i.  181;  one  of  the  edi 
tors  of  the  National  Anti-Slavery 
Standard,  192;  proposes  to  J.  R.  L. 
to  contribute,  196  ;  overrates  his 
popularity,  197. 


INDEX 


457 


Chartres,  J.  R.  L.  visits,  i.  380;  gives 
title  at  first  to  The  Cathedral,  ii. 
140. 

"  Chastelard,"  ii.  92. 

Chaucer,  treated  by  J.  R.  L.  in  Con 
versations,  i.  134 ;  quotation  from 
paper  on,  ii.  88;  his  appropriation  of 
others'  work,  132. 

Chelsea,  J.  R.  L.'s  address  at,  ii. 
32G. 

Chester,  J.  R.  L.  at,  with  Canon 
Kingsley,  ii.  153. 

Chicago,  address  at,  by  J.  R.  L.,  ii. 
351. 

Child,  David  Lee,  editor  of  the  Stand 
ard,  i.  192. 

Child,  Francis  James,  edits  the  Brit 
ish  Poets,  i.  364;  J.  R.  L.  shows  him 
the  Commemoration  Ode,  ii.  63,  68, 
note  ;  likes  .Fife  Adam's  Story,  104  ; 
accompanies  J.  R.  L.  to  Baltimore, 
213;  his  popularity  there,  214  ;  J. 
R.  L.  to,  on  the  St.  Andrews  affair, 
300. 

Child,  Mrs.  Lydia  Maria,  the  "  Philo- 
thea  "  of,  i.  80  ;  characterized  by 
J.  R.  L.  in  the  Pioneer,  105;  her 
"Letters  from  New  York,"  114; 
her  editorship  of  the  Standard,  192  ; 
in  A  Fable  for  Critics,  245. 

Chippewa  Legend,  A,  i.  125. 

Chivers,  T.  H.,  i.  375. 

Choate,  Rufus,  J.  R.  L.'s  article  on, 
ii.  14. 

Choir,  village,  J.  R.  L.'s  characteri 
zation  of,  i.  20. 

Christ,  and  Christianity,  i.  169. 

Christ  Church,  Cambridge,  ecclesias 
tical  home  of  loyalists,  i.  2  ;  J.  R. 
L.  attends,  ii.  311. 

Church,  the,  J.  R.  L.'s  comments  on, 
in  Conversations,  i.  141-145;  a  bul 
wark  of  Paganism,  170. 

Church  and  the  Clergy,  The,  J.  R.  L.'s 
articles  in  Pennsylvania  Freeman, 
i.  169. 

Civil-service  reform,  importance  of, 
ii.  194,  202  ;  reference  to,  at  caucus, 
210  ;  address  on,  by  J.  R.  L.,  377. 

Clarke,  James  Freeman,  in  politics, 
ii.  201. 

Class  Poem  by  J.  R.  L.,  i.  48,  50,  51, 
53,  54,  56-61. 

Clemm,  Mrs.,  Poe's  mother-in-law,  J. 
R.  L.'s  relations  with,  i.  282. 


Cleveland,  Grover,  elected  president, 
ii.  316 ;  J.  R.  L.'s  judgment  on, 
324. 

Clifford,  Mrs.  W.  K.,  J.  R.  L.  to,  on 
confidants,  ii.  323  ;  J.  R.  L  to,  in 
response  to  an  invitation,  391. 

Clough,  Arthur  Hugh,  comes  to  Amer 
ica  on  same  boat  with  J.  R.  L.,  i. 
346;  his  reception  in  Boston  and 
Cambridge,  346  ;  describes  the  Low 
ell  household,  347;  J.  R.  L.'s  judg 
ment  of  his  "  Bothie,"  347;  Crancb. 
reminds  J.  R.  L.  of,  ii.  96. 

Coercion  Act,  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii.  281. 

Coleridge,  Samuel  Taylor,  J.  R.  L.  be 
comes  acquainted  with  the  poems 
of,  i.  32  ;  J.  R.  L.  compares  his  own 
odes  with  those  of,  ii.  44,  note  ;  his 
want  of  scruple  in  matters  of  liter 
ary  honesty,  134;  J.  R.  L.  on  unveil 
ing  the  bust  of,  321. 

Colosseum  at  Rome,  i.  338. 

Commemoration  Ode,  i.  400 ;  tried  on 
F.  J.  Child,  ii.  63  ;  exhausts  J.  R. 
L.,  64;  to  be  read  aloud,  66;  its 
composition,  67;  its  power  to  stimu 
late,  70;  a  shrine  of  Lincoln,  71. 

Concord,  Massachusetts,  J.  R.  L.  sent 
there  in  suspension  from  college,  i. 
47  ;  his  life  there,  50-56. 

"  Conquest  of  Canaan,"  Dwight's,  ii. 
361. 

Contributors'  Club,  article  in,  by  J. 
R.  L.,  ii.  398. 

Conversations  on  some  of  the  Old 
Poets,  quoted,  i.  17;  book  published, 
132  ;  its  contents  analyzed,  134-145 ; 
reviewed  by  Poe  in  the  Mirror,  163 ; 
compared  with  later  work  on  same 
subject,  ii.  354. 

Cooke,  Philip  Pendleton,  ii.  362. 

Cooper,  James  Fenimore,  in  A  Fable 
for  Critics,  i.  254;  has  no  desire  to 
start  a  magazine,  419 ;  characterized, 
ii.  364. 

Copyright,  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii.  326-332. 

"  Cornwallis,  The,"  village  drama  of, 
i.  25. 

Courtin\  The,  i.  300. 

Craneh,  Christopher  Pearse,  visits  J. 
R.  L.,  ii.  95 ;  his  ill-success,  96. 

Crawford,  Thomas,  i.  332. 

Crayon,  The,  Stillman's  journal,  L 
367,  378. 

Credidimus  Jovem  regnare,  ii.  368. 


458 


INDEX 


Critic,    The,    publishes    a    "Lowell 

Birthday  number,"  ii.  387. 
Cromwell,  treated  poetically  by  J.  R. 

L.,  i.  124;  wanted  by  him  for  Amer 
ica,  ii.  28. 
Crosby  &  Nichols,  publishers  of  the 

North  American  Review,  ii.  47. 
Cuba,  Spanish  relations  with,  ii.  254 ; 

rumors  of   American  purchase  of, 

255. 
Curtis,  George  Ticknor,  recalls  Mr. 

Wells' s  school,  i.  23. 
Curtis,  George  William,  and  Putnam's 

Monthly,  i.  348  ;  his  "Prue  and  I," 

350. 
Cushing,  Caleb,  J.  R.  L.'s  article  on, 

ii.  14,  15. 

Dall,  Mrs.  Caroline  Healey,  quoted  on 
Charles  Lowell,  i.  10. 

Dana,  Edmund,  brother  of  R.  H.  D., 
Jr.,i.  22. 

Dana,  Richard  Henry,  ii.  365. 

Dana,  Richard  Henry,  Jr.,  an  early 
friend  of  J.  R.  L.,  i.  22  ;  death 
of,  commented  on  by  J.  R.  L.,  ii. 
296. 

Dante,  quoted  by  J.  R.  L.  in  his  col 
lege  days,  i.  54  ;  in  Florence,  314  ; 
teaching  of,  by  J.  R.  L.,  385  ;  influ 
ence  over  J.  R.  L.,  390  ;  portrait  of, 
given  by  J.  R.  L.  to  his  class,  393  ; 
"  New  Life  "  of,  given  also,  393  ; 
the  church  in  which  he  was  bap 
tized,  394 ;  not  used  in  examination, 
395 ;  Longfellow's  translation  of, 
scrutinized  by  the  Dante  Club,  ii. 
84 ;  and  reviewed  by  J.  R.  L.  and 
C.  E.  Norton,  113;  article  on,  by 
J.  R.  L.,  150  ;  some  interpretation 
'  of,  by  J.  R.  L.,  381. 

Darkened  Mind,  The,  a  record  of 
J.  R.  L.'s  mother,  i.  91 ;  quoted, 
305. 

Darley,  Felix  Octavius  Carr,  marriage 
of,  i.  440. 

Davis,  Mr.  (and  Mrs.)  Edward  M., 
friends  of  Mrs.  White  and  M.  W.,  i. 
151 ;  arrange  for  J.  R.  L.'s  work  in 
Philadelphia,  152;  entertain  the 
Lowells  at  their  home,  173  ;  J.  R.  L. 
writes  to,  176,  177  ;  written  to  on 
birth  of  Blanche,  178. 

Davis,  Jefferson,  J.  R.  L.'s  phrases 
on,  ii.  9,  10. 


Day  in  June,  A,  i.  269. 

"Days"  by  Emerson,  J.  R.  L.  on, 
i.  414. 

Dead  House,  The,  i.  435. 

Declaration  of  Independence,  i.  209. 

"Decuman,"  J.  R.  L.'s  defence  of 
the  word,  ii.  140. 

Dedications  to  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  401. 

Deerfoot  Farm,  J.  R.  L.'s  residence 
at,  ii.  322. 

Democracy,  ii.  312-316. 

Democracy  and  Other  Addresses,  ii. 
334  ;  copyright  on,  350. 

Dickens,  Charles,  compared  with 
Thackeray  by  J.  R.  L.,  i.  297;  let 
ters  of,  published  by  Forster  and 
Fields,  ii.  149. 

Dirge,  A,  extracts  from,  i.  147. 

Dixwell,  Epes  Sargent,  a  New  Eng 
land  scholar,  i.  23. 

Dr.  Primrose,  the  name  given  by 
J.  R.  L.  to  his  father,  i.  11. 

Donne,  John,  on  Elizabeth  Drury,  i. 
361 ;  his  poems  revised  by  J.  R.  L., 
ii.  102 ;  edited  for  Grolier  Club, 
102,  note. 

Douglas,  David,  the  Edinburgh  pub 
lisher,  ii.  329. 

Downing,  Major  Jack,  i.  261. 

"  Dred  "  by  Mrs.  Stowe,  i.  409,  412. 

Dresden,  J.  R.  L.  settles  down  in, 
for  study,  i.  381  ;  his  winter  in, 
383. 

Dresel,  Otto,  i.  442. 

Dryden,  John,  J.  R.  L.  edits  poems  of, 
ii.  101. 

Dublin,  J.  R.  L.  at,  ii.  153. 

Dunlap,  Elizabeth,  i.  400. 

Dunlap,  Frances,  governess  of  Mabel 
Lowell,  i.  401 ;  her  character,  401  ; 
characterized  by  J.  R.  L. ,  401 ;  mar 
ries  J.  R.  L.,  241  ;  see  Lowell, 
Frances  Dunlap. 

Durham,  J.  R.  L.'s  impression  of,  ii. 
156. 

Duyckinck,  Evert  Augustus,  J.  R.  L. 
writes  to,  with  sonnets,  i.  95  ;  writes 
to  J.  R.  L.  proposing  a  book,  135  ; 
J.  R.  L.  writes  to,  about  Hawthorne, 
283  ;  his  and  his  brother's  Cyclo 
paedia  of  American  Literature,  ii. 
362. 

Dwight,  John  Sullivan,  contributor  to 
the  Pioneer,  i.  105. 

Dwight,  Timothy,  ii.  361. 


INDEX 


459 


Edwards,  Jonathan,  ii.  361. 

Election  in  November,  The,  ii.  17. 

Eliot,  Charles  William,  on  Commemo 
ration  Ode,  ii.  69. 

Eliot,  Samuel,  remembers  J.  R.  L.'s 
boyhood,  i.  24. 

Eliot,  Dr.  S.  R.,  treats  J.  R.  L.  for 
trouble  with  his  eyes,  i.  109;  is  a 
compagnon  du  voyage,  380. 

Elm  wood,  birthplace  of  J.  R.  L.,  i.  1  ; 
one  of  the  loyalist  houses,  2  ;  de 
scribed,  4 ;  its  successive  owners, 
4-6  ;  as  a  nesting- place  for  J.  R.  L., 
15,  16 ;  J.  R.  L.  will  not  use  it  as  a 
title  to  a  volume,  ii.  119  ;  J.  R.  L.'s 
final  return  to,  393. 

Elwyn,  Dr.,  i.  155. 

Ely,  J.  R.  L.  at,  i.  345. 

Emerson,  Ralph  Waldo,  characterizes 
Charles  Lowell,  i.  8 ;  J.  R.  L.  goes 
to  hear  him  lecture  in  his  junior  year 
at  college,  49  ;  his  acquaintance  made 
by  J.  R.  L.  in  Concord,  50 ;  ani 
madverted  on  in  class  poem;  56,  57  ; 
letter  to,  by  J.  R.  L.  in  exculpation, 
58,  59;  his  abandonment  of  the  min 
istry,  64;  characterizes  "  Philo- 
thea,"  80  ;  introduced  into  A  Fable 
for  Critics,  239,  240,  243,  254  ;  on 
J.  R.  L.'s  magazine  project,  287  ;  as 
a  friend  of  Thoreau,  293;  charac 
teristic  of,  297  ;  promises  to  write  for 
Putnam's,  350  ;  his  "  Adirondacs  " 
quoted,  404 ;  a  member  of  the 
Adirondack  Club,  405  ;  dines  with 
Mr.  Phillips,  410 ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on 
his  signature  of  article,  414  ;  on 
"  Days,"  414  ;  his  Brahma,_415j 
J.  R.  L.  to,  on  his  contributions,  416  ; 
his  importance  to  the  Atlantic,  420  ; 
advised  by  J.  R.  L.  respecting  his 
publisher,  451, 

Comments  of,  on  J.  R.  L.'s  poetry, 
ii.  33,  note;  on  Lincoln,  71 ;  extract 
from  his  journal  on  J.  R.  L.'s 
poetry,  121 ;  is  with  J.  R.  L.  in 
Paris,  161 ;  his  character,  164  ;  good 
to  love,  167  ;  in  Agassiz,  177,  178 ; 
on  J.  R.  L.'s  Under  the  Old  Elm, 
189;  characterized,  365 ;  his  Life  by 
J.  E.  Cabot,  366. 
Emiliani,  i.  329. 
Endymion,  ii.  371. 

England,  J.  R.  L.  finds  reaction  in 
politics  since  1848,  in,  ii.  27  ;  J.  R.  L. 


an  exponent  of  American  temper 

toward,  40. 
Episcopal    church,    J.    R.  L.   on,   ii. 

311. 
Epistle  to  George  William  Curtis,  An, 

quoted,  i.  17 ;  postscript  to,  ii.  368. 
E  Pluribus    Unum,   ii.   23 ;   quoted, 

276. 

Erskine,  Fanny,  i.  329. 
"  Essays  on  Free  Thinking  and  Plain 

Speaking,"  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii.  175. 
Estrangement,  ii.  295. 
Eudamidas,  brother  of  Agis,  i.  434. 
Eurydice,  i.  228. 
Evarts,   William  Maxwell,   J.   R.   L. 

sends  despatch  to  on  congratulating 

the   king  of  Spain,  ii.  224;  and  on 

the  king's  marriage,  230 ;  and  on  a 

bull  fight,    234;    J.    R.  L.    to,   on 

the    Irish   question,  277 ;  approves 

J.  R.  L.'s  course,  280. 
Every  Saturday,  J.  R.  L.  proposes  to 

translate  for,  ii.  137. 
Exhibition  Day  at  Harvard,  i.  26. 
Ex-Mayor's    Crumb    of  Consolation, 

The,  i.  259. 

Fable  for  Critics,  A,  quoted,  i.  139, 
166 ;  begun,  238  ;  specimens  of  it 
sent  to  Briggs,  239 ;  a  gift  to  that 
friend,  240  ;  proposed  disposition  of 
profits  by  J.  R.  L.,  241;  by  Briggs, 
242;  interrupted,  243;  resumed, 

245  ;  passage  in  it  on  bores,  traced, 

246  ;  its  title-page,  249  ;  published, 
250 ;  comparison  with  Hunt's  "  The 
Feast  of  the  Poets,"  250 ;  no  mys 
tery    about    its     authorship,    251  ; 
J.   R.   L.'s  afterthought  of  it,  252 ; 
its  ephemeral    character,   253 ;    its 
permanent  qualities,  254  ;  its  expres 
sion  of  its  author,  254  ;  thrown  into 
the   shade   by  the  Biglow  Papers, 
255 ;    the  apostrophe  to  Massachu 
setts  in   it,   266;    contrasted    with 
Agassiz,  ii.  176. 

"  Faery  Queene,  The,"  the  first  poem 
read  by  J.  R.  L.,  i.  14  ;  discussed  by 
the  boys  J.  R.  L.  and  W.  W.  S.,  24. 

Falconer,  The,  afterward  The  Falcon, 
i.  180. 

Fancy's  Casuistry,  i.  406. 

Fawcett,  Edgar,  J.  R.  L.  praises,  ii. 
199. 

Fay,  Maria,  letter  to,  from  J.  R.  L.  of 


460 


INDEX 


entrance  into  Rome,  i.  318 ;  of 
Christmas,  323. 

Fayerweather  house  in  Cambridge, 
i.  3. 

"Feast  of  the  Poets,  The,"  by  Leigh 
Hunt,  i.  250;  compared  with  the 
Fable,  251. 

"Federalist,  The,"  as  a  piece  of 
American  literature,  ii.  362. 

Feltham,  Owen,  ii.  359. 

Felton,  Cornelius  Con  way,  professor 
of  Greek  at  Harvard  in  J.  R.  L.'s 
youth,  i.  27  ;  one  of  the  editors  of 
an  annual,  93  ;  has  a  copy  of  A 
Fable  for  Critics  sent  him,  249  ;  at 
supper  at  Longfellow's,  346 ;  dis 
covers  a  cryptic  joke  of  J.  R.  L., 
434. 

Field,  John  W.,  meets  J.  R.  L.  at 
Orvieto,  i.  384;  visits  the  Lowells 
with  his  wife,  ii.  251 ;  a  friend  to 
J.  R.  L.  in  his  troubles,  252 ;  with 
his  wife  stays  with  Mrs.  Lowell 
while  J.  R.  L.  goes  to  England, 
258 ;  J.  R.  L.  writes  him  on  letter- 
writing,  266  ;  his  sociability,  272  ; 
J.  R.  L.  writes  him  from  Paris, 
273 ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  his  own  absti 
nence,  296  ;  letter  from  J.  R.  L. 
to,  on  death  of  Mrs.  Lowejl,  319 ; 
and  on  growing  old,  325. 

Fielding,  Henry,  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii.  298. 

Fields,  James  Thomas,  wants  J.  R.  L. 
to  write  a  novel,  i.  348  ;  asks  also 
for  his  Lowell  Institute  lectures, 
373  ;  succeeds  J.  R.  L.  as  editor  of 
the  Atlantic,  453  ;  calls  forth  the 
second  series  of  Biglow  Papers,  ii. 
35  ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  sending  him  Mr. 
Hosea  Biglow  to  the  Editor  of  the 
Atlantic  Monthly,  57  ;  J.  R.  L.  to, 
on  sending  him  Fitz  Adam's  Story, 
105 ;  and  a  tale  and  poem  for  Our 
Young  Folks,  105  ;  writes  a  notice  of 
A  June  Idyll  which  calls  out  a 
poetical  response  from  J.  R.  L., 
116;  discusses  title  of  J.  R.  L.'s 
book,  119 ;  J.  R.  L.  sends  him  the 
log  of  the  North  American,  122; 
asked  to 'print  the  journal  of  a  Vir 
ginia  gentleman,  135;takes  J.  R.  L.'s 
daughter  Mabel  to  Europe,  137 ; 
The  Cathedral  dedicated  to  him, 
140;  publishes  "Yesterdays  with 
Authors,"  149. 


"Financial  Flurry,  The,"   by  Parke 

Godwin,  ii.  2. 
Fireside  Travels,  firs^  title  given  to 

Cambridge   Thirty   Years   Ago,    i. 

354.    " 

First  Snow-Fail,  The,  i.  274. 
Fischer,  Peter,  i.  392. 
Fish,  Hamilton,  ii.  203. 
Fitz  Adam's    Story,   i.   302 ;  read  by 

F.  J.  Child,  ii.  104. 
Florence,  the  Lowells  in,  i.  314-316. 
Follen,    Charles,      characterized    by 

J.  R.  L.  in  the  Pioneer,  i.  106. 
Follen,  Eliza  Lee,  contributor  to  the 

Standard,  i.  193. 
Foote,    Henry    Stuart,    satirized    by 

J.  R.  L.,  i.  215. 

Forbes,  Mrs.  Archibald,  ii.  335. 
"  Forerunners,"  Emerson's,  i.  378. 
Foster,     Stephen,     portrait     of     by 

J.  R.  L.,  i.  231. 

Fountain  of  Youth,  The,  i.  35L. 
Fountain's  Abbey,  ii.  154,  iBlf 
Fragments  of  an  Unfinished  Poem,  i. 

302,  353. 

France,    the    revolution    in,  charac 
terized  by  J.  R.  L.,  i.  204-206. 
"  Frederick  the  Great,"  Carlyle's,  ii. 

89. 
"  Free  Lance  in  the  Field  of  Life  and 

Letters,  A,"  ii.  197,  note. 
Freiligrath,      Ferdinand,    wishes    to 

succeed  Longfellow,  i.  375. 
Frelinghuysen,    Frederick  Theodore, 

succeeds  Mr.   Elaine  in  State    de 
partment,  ii.  290,  note. 
Fremont,  John  Charles,  J.  R.  L.  looks 

wistfully  toward,  ii.  29. 
French,  Old,  J.  R.  L.'s  studies  in,  ii. 

186,  187. 
French  Revolution   of  1848,  The,  i. 

204. 

Freneau,  Philip,  his  one  line,  ii.  361. 
"  Friendship,"    Thoreau's    essay    on, 

noticed  by  J.  R.  L.,  i.  293. 
Frost,  Rev.  Barzillai,  the  clergyman 

with  whom  J.  R.  L.  studied  at  Con 
cord,  i.  47,  48,  51. 
Fugitive  Slave  Bill,  ii.  6. 
Fuller,  [Sarah]  Margaret,  in  A  Fable 

for  Critics,  i.  244-247 ;  criticises  J. 

R.  L.,  244,  note. 
Furness,  Horace  Howard,  on  praise  of 

J.  R.  L.,  ii.  388. 


INDEX 


461 


Gallillee,  the  Misses,  ii.  356. 

Gardner,  Francis,  master  of  Boston 
Latin  School,  i.  23. 

Garfield,  James  Abram,  his  illness  and 
the  sympathy  of  England,  ii.  268  ; 
his  death,  270. 

Garrison,  William  Lloyd,  character 
ized  by  J.  R.  L.  in  the  Pioneer,  i. 
105 ;  treatment  of,  by  J.  R.  L.  in 
London  Daily  Neivs,  187  ;  his  char 
acter  sketched,  189  ;  the  verses  upon 
him,  190  ;  his  Liberator,  192  ;  what 
he  thought  of  J.  R.  L.,  197;  his 
views  on  anonymous  articles,  199 ; 
two  poems  on,  by  J.  R.  L.,  258-260  ; 
his  ineffectiveness  compared  with 
the  Charleston  batteries,  ii.  26. 

Gay,  Sydney  Howard,  one  of  the  edi 
tors  of  Standard,  i.  192  ;  sole  editor, 
192 ;  letter  to,  by  J.  R.  L.  defining 
relations  with,  194-200  ;  his  views 
on  signed  articles,  199  ;  confers  with 
J.  R.  L.,  202;  writes  respecting 
J.  R.  L.'s  terms,  203  ;  has  no  time 
to  compliment  J.  R.  L.,  212;  his 
earnestness,  228 ;  edits  a  contribu 
tion  by  J.  R.  L.,  229 ;  values  J.  R.  L.'s 
work,  229,  230  ;  not  absolute  in  his 
control  of  Standard,  230  ;  his  finan 
cial  aid  of  J.  R.  L.,  281 ;  J.  R.  L. 
writes  to,  of  his  own  delinquency, 
295 ;  loses  a  child,  305  ;  is  invited 
to  join  the  Lowells  in  Europe,  307  ; 
enquires  into  the  landing  of  the  Pil 
grims,  307,  note  ;  has  a  hand  in  the 
reissue  of  Biglow  Papers  in  Fng- 
land,  454. 

Geneva,  ii.  171. 

George,  Henry,  ii.  315. 

Gerry,  Elbridge,  lives  at  Elmwood, 
i.  5. 

Gesu,  music  at  the  church  of,  i.  326. 

Ghent,  ii.  170. 

Gibraltar,  Straits  of,  i.  313. 

Gibson,  Right  Hon.  Edward,  ii.  300. 

Giher,  Don  Palo,  ii.  336. 

Gilbert,  William  Schwenck,  topical 
songs  of,  i.  258. 

Gilder,  Richard  Watson,  J.  R.  L. 
writes  to,  on  the  North  American  and 
Lincoln,  ii.  51,  note  ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on 
composition  of  Commemoration 
Ode,  63 ;  J.  R.  L.  sends  poems  to, 
295  ;  J.  R.  L.  sends  Lander's  letters 
to,  342  ;  and  writes  rhymes  on  Mrs. 


Gilder,  343,  note  ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  387 ; 

gives  poem  at  Harvard,  397. 
Gilman,  Miss  Alice,  J.  R.  L.  to,  with 

sonnet,  ii.  214,  215. 
Giner  de  los  Rios,  Don  Herminigildo, 

Spanish  teacher  of  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  242. 
Giotto,  portrait  of  Dante  by,  i.  393. 
Girandola,  the,  i.  341. 
Gladstone,  William  Ewart,  Irish  lack 

of  faith  in,  ii.  280  ;  epigram  on,  334. 
Glance  behind  the  Curtain,  A,  i.  124. 
Gloucester,  J.  R.  L.  on  cathedral  at, 

ii.  157. 
Godkiu,  Edwin  Lawrence,  J.  R.  L.  to, 

on     impeachment,    ii.    109,    note ; 

J.  R.  L.  to,  on  grandchildren,  185 ; 

Three  Memorial  Poems  inscribed  to, 

213  ;  advises  J.  R.  L.  to  accept  the 

mission  to  Spain,  220. 
Godwin,       Parke,      and      Putnam's 

Monthly,  i.  348 ;  writes  for  Atlantic, 

ii.  2,  3,  4. 
Goethe,  J.  R.  L.  comments  on,  i.  79 ; 

associations  of,  with  Offenbach  and 

Weimar,  271. 
Gold  Democrats,  political  advantage 

of  the,  i.  213. 
Gold-Egg ;  a  Dream  Fantasy,  ii.  58, 

note. 
Goldsmith,  Oliver,  his  "  Retaliation," 

ii.  174. 
Goodwin,   William    Watson,    ii.    145, 

note. 
Good   Word  for   Winter,  A,  ii.    34, 

note,  112,  143. 
Graham's  Magazine,  notice  of  J.  R.  L. 

in,   i.   97  ;  J.  R.  L.  asked  to  write 

for,    153 ;    his    early    contributions 

to,  161 ;  article  on  Poe  contributed 

to,   162  ;   Leaves  from  my  Italian 

Journey  published  in,  364. 
Grant,  Ulysses  Simpson,  second  ad 
ministration  of,  ii.  191 ;  visits  Spain, 

247 ;  his  visit  to  Cuba  thought  sig 
nificant  in  Spain,  255. 
Granville,   Lord,  on  Irish-Americans, 

ii.   287  ;  compared  with  J.   R.   L., 

291. 

Grasmere,  ii.  156. 

Gray,  Asa,  J.  R.  L.'s  lines  on,  ii.  325. 
Gray,  Thomas,  J.  R.  L.  compares  his 

own  odes  with  those  of,  ii.  44,  note. 
Greece,   J.  R.  L.'s  impressions  of,  ii. 

238. 
Griswold,  Rufus  Wilmot,  on  Poe,  L 


462 


INDEX 


164;  J.  R.  L.'s  characterization  of, 

164. 
Grolier  Club  publishes  Donne,  ii.  102, 

note. 
Gurney,   Ephraim  Whitman,  ii.  122, 

123. 

Hale,  Edward  Everett,  quoted,  i.  24; 
his  reference  to  "  The  Band,"  89. 

Hale,  Nathan,  an  editor  of  Harvard- 
iana,  i.  45  ;  editor  of  Boston  Mis 
cellany,  98. 

Halleck,  Fitz  Greene,  reviewed  by  J. 
R.  L.,  i.  160. 

Hallowell,  Mrs.  R.  P.,  reminiscence 
by,  i.  173. 

Hallyar,  J.,  i.  332. 

Hamadryad,  The,  i.  289. 

Hamilton  College  invites  J.  R.  L.  to 
give  a  poem,  i.  379. 

Harper's  New  Monthly  Magazine,  i. 
349. 

Harvard  College,  i.  25 ;  its  modest 
proportions  in  J.  R.  L.'s  boyhood, 
26  ;  its  great  days,  26,  27 ;  its  offi 
cers,  27  ;  its  courses  of  study,  29  ; 
its  discipline,  30 ;  holds  commemo 
ration  over  soldiers,  ii.  63  ;  address 
before,  on  250th  anniversary,  337. 

Harvard  Crimson,  The,  publishes  ex 
tracts  of  lectures  by  J.  R.  L.,  i.  396. 

Harvardiana,  the  college  paper  of 
which  J.  R.  L.  was  an  editor,  i.  44, 45. 

"  Hasty  Pudding,"  Barlow's,  ii.  361. 

Hasty  Pudding  Club,  i.  40. 

Hawley,  Joseph  Roswell,  ii.  326. 

Hawthorne,  Nathaniel,  contributor  to 
the  Pioneer,  i.  105  ;  his  reference 
to  J.  R.  L.  in  "  The  Hall  of  Fan 
tasy,"  117  ;  characterized  in  A  Fa 
ble  for  Critics,  254 ;  aided  by  J.  R. 
L.  and  others,  283;  his  letters  and  ac 
tion  in  the  case,  283-286;  promises 
contributions  to  Putnam'1.1;,  350  ;  his 
importance  to  the  Atlantic,  420 ; 
his  advantage  in  seeing  Lincoln,  ii. 
72 ;  Life  of,  suggested  to  J.  R.  L., 
102  ;  characterized,  3G5  ;  J.  R.  L.  to 
write  his  life,  372. 

Hawthorne,  Sophia,  M.  W.  L.  to,  i. 
155;  publishes  her  husband's  "  Note- 
Books,"  ii.  102. 

Haydon,  Benjamin  Robert,  and  John 
Keats,  i.  116;  discourses  on  the 
Elgin  marbles,  117. 


Hayes,  Rutherford  Birchard,  J.  R.  L. 
votes  for,  ii.  216  ;  his  invitation  to 
J.  R.  L.  through  W.  D.  Howells,  to 
take  a  foreign  embassy,  217  ;  comes 
to  Boston,  where  J.  R.  L.  meets 
him,  218  ;  the  impression  he  makes 
onJ.  R.  L.,  219. 

Hayward,  Abraham,  abuses  Monckton 
Milnes,  ii.  335. 

Hazlitt,  William  Carew,  as  editor,  ii. 
78. 

Heartsease  and  Rue,  collected,  ii.  357 ; 
published,  368. 

Heath,  John  Francis,  aids  J.  R.  L.  in 
the  publication  of  A  Year's  Life,  i. 
93. 

Hemans,  Charles,  i.  332. 

Herbert,  Auberon,  ii.  335. 

Hereford,  ii.  157. 

Herrick,  Mrs.  Sophie  Bledsoe,  charac 
terizes  Mrs.  F.  D.  Lowell,  i.  404; 
on  composition  of  Commemoration 
Ode,  ii.  65,  note ;  writes  an  article 
on  J.  R.  L.,  196;  and  calls  out  a 
response,  197;  entertains  J.  R.  L. 
in  Baltimore,  214 ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on 
church-going,  311. 

Higginson,  Thatcher,  schoolmate  of 
J.  R.  L.,  i.  22. 

Higginson,  Thomas  Wentworth,  day- 
scholar  with  J.  R.  L.  at  Mr.  Wells's 
school,  i.  22 ;  his  recollection  of  J. 
R.  L.'s  boyhood,  24 ;  his  "  Old  Cam 
bridge  "  on  J.  R.  L.'s  suspension, 
47  ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  T.  Parker,  290, 
note  ;  Underwood  writes  to,  about 
a  projected  magazine,  354,  note; 
letter  to,  from  J.  R.  L.  on  the  in- 
dependence  of  the  Atlantic,  426  ;  J. 
R.  L.  to,  on  Commemoration  Ode,  ii. 
67,  note  ;  his  saying  on  cosmopoli- 
tanism,  79 ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  Italy,  270. 

Hilda,  B.  V.  Sancta,  the  patroness  oi' 
Whitby,  ii.  381. 

Hill,  Thomas,  ii.  135. 

Hillard,  George  Stillman,  editor  of 
an  annual,  i.  93  ;  is  go-between  for 
J.  R.  L.  and  others  with  Hawthorne, 
284. 

Hitchcock,  Rev.  Jeduthun,  successor 
to  Parson  Wilbur,  ii.  38. 

Hoar,  Ebenezer  Rockwood,  J.  R.  L. 
makes  the  acquaintance  of,  i.  50  ; 
member  of  the  Adirondack  Club, 
405;  hip  dpeech  at  Stillman 's  din- 


INDEX 


463 


net-,  448 ;  J.  R.  L.  dedicates  second 
series  of  Biglow  Papers  to,  ii.  104; 
J.  R.  L.'s  last  note  to,  407. 
Hob  Gobbling' s  Song,  ii.  10G. 
Hogarth,  J.  R.  L.'s  pleasure  in,  ii.  155, 

171. 

Holmes,  John,  friend  of  J.  R.  L.  and 
member  with  him  of  whist  club,  i. 
271 ;  his  whimsical  mode  of  giving 
a  gift,  311 ;  letter  to,  from  J.  R.  L., 
descriptive  of  life  in  Florence,  315  ; 
letter  to,  from  J.  R.  L.,  giving  im 
pressions  of  Rome,  342 ;  a  member  j 
of  the  Adirondack  Club,  405;  on  his  j 
brother's  musical  gifts,  448;  hears 
Commemoration  Ode,  ii.  64 ;  J.  R.  L. 
finds  him  in  London,  154 ;  and  in 
Paris,  161 ;  companion  to  J.  R.  L. 
in  Paris,  163. 

Holmes,  Oliver  Wendell,  in  A  Fable 
for  Critics,  i.  248,  254 ;  has  a  copy 
of  the  book  sent  him,  249;  writes 
of  it  to  J.  R.  L.,  251  ;  is  written  to 
about  it  by  J.  R.  L.,  252,  note ;  his 
poem  at  dinner  given  to  J.  R.  L., 
379  ;  dines  with  Mr.  Phillips,  411 ; 
J.  R.  L.  makes  it  a  condition  prece 
dent  to  the  editorship  of  the  Allan-  j 
tic,  that  he  shall  be  a  contributor, 
413;  how  he  was  regarded  by  some 
of  the  public,  426;  his  poem  in 
"The  Round  Table,"  431;  on  the 
Saturday  Club,  447  ;  tells  stories  at 
dinner,  448  ;  takes  a  photograph  of 
J.  R.  L.,  ii.  72  ;  has  a  colloquy  with 
Anthony  Trollope,  83 ;  J.  R.  L. 
takes  his  place  with  an  ode,  189;  J. 
R.  L.  to,  on  Irish  troubles,  292;  his 
one  imperishable  poem,  365. 

Holmes,  Oliver  Wendell,  Jr.,  wounded, 
ii.  31. 

Home,  The,  i.  435. 

Home  rule,  as  a  cure  for  Irish  ills,  ii. 
284. 

Houghton,  Henry  Oscar,  first  printer 
of  the  Atlantic,  i.  421. 

Howe,  Estes,  marries  M.  W.  L.'s  sis 
ter,  i.  267  ;  member,  with  J.  R.  L., 
of  whist  club,  271 ;  letter  to,  from 
J.  R.  L.  of  approach  to  African 
coast,  313;  writes  to  J.  R.  L.  of  his 
father's  illness,  317;  letter  to,  from 
J.  R.  L.  on  travel,  329;  J.  R.  L. 
makes  his  home  with,  384  ;  member 
of  the  Adirondack  Club,  405. 


Howells,  William  Dean,  characterizes 
Mrs.  Frances  Dunlap  Lowell,  i.  403; 
reviews  Longfellow's  Dante,  ii.  113 ; 
J.  R.  L.  to  him  on  his  writing,  and 
on  contributions  to  the  Atlantic, 
127;  and  on  The  Cathedral,  139; 
his  account  of  the  offer  of  a  foreign 
mission  to  J.  R.  L.,  217  ;  secures  a 
poem  from  J.  R.  L.  for  Harper's 
Monthly,  394. 

How  I  consulted  the  Oracle  of  the 
Goldfishes,  ii.  368,  369. 

Hubbard,  Gardiner  Greene,  on  copy 
right,  ii.  327. 

Hughes,  Thomas,  introduces  the  Big- 
low  Papers  in  England,  i.  256  ;  J. 
R.  L.'s  letter  to,  on  the  book,  257, 
262  ;  his  familiarity  with  the  book, 
264 ;  J.  R.  L.  writes  to,  on  the  de 
mand  for  more  Biglow,  ii.  32  ;  J. 
R.  L.  makes  personal  acquaintance 
of,  145  ;  letters  of  J.  R.  L.  to,  on 
third  journey  in  Europe,  151,  152, 
164,  170,  172,  182,  183  ;  J.  R.  L.  to, 
on  the  political  situation,  204  ;  J.  R. 
L.  advises  him  of  his  appointment 
to  Spain,  219. 

Hungarian  question,  the,  discussed  by 
Mrs.  Putnam  and  J.  R.  L.,  i.  303, 
304. 

Hunt,  Leigh,  his  "  Feast  of  the  Poets," 

possibly  suggestive  of  A  Fable  for 

Critics,  i.  250 ;  his  poem  compared 

with  that,  251 ;  J.  R.  L.  meets,  381. 

"  Hyperion,"  i.  347. 

lanthe,  a  poetic  image  of  M.  W.,  i.  83. 
"  Ichabod,"  by  Whittier,  i.  201. 
"Illusions,"    by  Emerson,  J.   R.   L. 

on,  i.  414,  415. 

Imaginary  Conversation,  An,  i.  215. 
Impeachment,  J.   R.   L.   on,   ii.   109, 

note. 
Impressions  of  Spain,  referred  to,  and 

quoted  from,  ii.  230,  242,  244. 
"  In  a  Cellar,"  by  H.  E.  Prescott,  i. 

449. 

In  an  Album,  ii.  205. 
Incident  in  a  Railroad  Car,  An,  i. 

146. 
Independent  in  Politics,  The  Place  oj 

the,  quoted,  i.  214,  ii.  313,  314 ;  de 
livered  in  New  York,  374. 
Indian    Summer    Reverie,     An,    i. 
|      278. 


464 


INDEX 


Infant  Prodigy,  The,  ii.  397. 

International  Copyright,  J.  R.  L.  on, 
in  speech  at  Washington,  ii.  326-332; 
in  an  epigram,  333  ;  Authors'  Read 
ing  for  benefit  of,  361. 

Interview,  a  disagreeable,  ii.  337. 

In  the  Half-way  House,  ii.  45. 

In  the  Twilight,  i.  406. 

Invita  Minerva,  i.  37^. 

Irene,  expressive  of  M.  W.,  i.  85,  86. 

Irish,  character  of,  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii. 
274  ;  relations  of,  with  England  com 
pared  with  Scottish,  276  ;  contention 
with  England,  278  ;  imperfect  sym 
pathy  of,  with  England,  280  ;  under 
guise  of  American  citizens,  282. 

Irish- American  cases,  ii.  284,  seq. 

Irving,  Washington,  in  A  Fable  for 
Critics,  i.  248 ;  his  writings  revived 
by  Putnam,  349;  his  relations  to 
magazines,  420 ;  characterized,  ii. 
363. 

Italy,  1859,  i.  434. 

James,  Henry,  on  J.  R.  L.'s  patriot 
ism,  ii.  80. 

James,  William,  letters  to,  on  coinci 
dence  in  Commemoration  Ode,  ii. 
67,  note. 

Jefferson,  Thomas,  characterized  by 
J.  R.  L.,  i.  218. 

Jewell,  Harvey,  i.  450. 

Jewett,  John  P.,  publisher  of  "  Uncle 
Tom's  Cabin,"  i.  354,  409. 

Jewish  race,  J.  R.  L.'s  interest  in,  ii. 
301-305. 

Johns  Hopkins  University,  J.  R.  L. 
lectures  before,  ii.  213. 

Johnson,  Andrew,  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii.  93. 

Johnson,  Reverdy,  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  the 
Spanish  mission,  ii.  220  ;  and  on  the 
work  at  Athens,  326. 

Jones,  William  Alfred,  i.  156. 

Judd,  Sylvester,  in  A  Fable  for  Critics, 
i.  248. 

June,  J.  R.  L.  the  poet  of,  i.  268,  269. 

June  Idyll,  A,  i.  302 ;  J.  R.  L.'s  hu 
morous  verses  on,  ii.  116. 

Kansas-Nebraska,  ii.  3,  6,  14. 

Kant,  Immanuel,  suggests  subject  of 

Class  Poem  to  J.  R.  L.,  i.  56. 
"•'  Kavanagh,"  reviewed  by  J.  R.  L.,  i. 

291. 
Keats,  John,  J.  R.   L.  becomes  ac 


quainted  with  the  poems  of,  i.  32 ; 
his  influence  on  J.  R.  L. ,  9-t ;  a  life 
of,  contemplated  by  J.  R.  L.,  95 ; 
sonnet  to,  by  J.  R.  L.,  95,  96; 
his  "  Isabella "  compared  with  A 
Legend  of  Brittany,  118 ;  Fanny 
Brawne  and,  121  ;  biographical 
sketch  of,  by  J.  R.  L.,__365_j  influ 
ences  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  88. 

Keswick,  ii.  156. 

Killarney,  J.  R.  L.  visits,  ii.  152. 

King,  Rufus,  i.  45,  46. 

Kingsley,  Charles,  shows  J.  R.  L. 
Chester  Cathedral,  ii.  153. 

"  Kobboltozo,"  by  C.  P.  Cranch,  ii. 
96,  note. 

Lake  Country,  J.  R.  L.  visits,  ii.  154, 
156. 

Lamartine,  characterized  by  J.  R.  L., 
i.  206. 

Lamartine,  To,  i.  206. 

Lamb,  Charles,  letter  of,  to  Manning, 
i.  438  ;  J.  R.  L.  compares  himself 
to,  in  his  fondness  for  London,  ii. 
335. 

Landor,  Walter  Savage,  J.  R.  L.  be 
comes  acquainted  with  the  writings 
of,  i.  31 ;  his  "  Imaginary  Conversa 
tion  "  contrasted  with  J.  R.  L.'s 
Conversations,  135  ;  reviewed  by  J. 
R.  L.  in  Massachusetts  Quarterly, 
293-295  ;  J.  R.  L.  visits,  345 ;  his 
antiques,  ii.  93 ;  his  letters  edited 
byJ.  R.  L.,342. 

Last  Poems,  ii.  368. 

Lawrence,  the  Misses,  J.  R.  L.  to,  on 
Wildbad,  ii.  384. 

Leaves  from  my  Journal,  referred  to, 
i.  310,  314. 

Lechmere  house  in  Cambridge,  i.  3. 

Lee,  Billy,  his  idea  of  a  competence, 
i.  2G7. 

Lee,  Judge  Joseph,  house  of,  in  Cam 
bridge,  i.  3. 

Lee,  William,  a  partner  in  Phillips  & 
Sampson,  i.  409  ;  takes  a  part  in  the 
establishment  of  the  Atlantic,  409, 
410  ;  absent  in  Europe  at  sale  of  the 
magazine,  450. 

Legend  of  Brittany,  A,  contrasted 
with  Keats's  "  Isabella,"  i.  118  ;  J. 
R.  L.'s  enjoyment  of,  119;  Briggs's 
comments  on,  120. 

Lessing,  J.  R.  L.  on  the  genius  of,  i 


INDEX 


4G5 


138  ;  temperament  of,  like  J.  R.  L.'s, 
ii.  110. 
Letter-writing,  conditions  of,  i.  445;  ii. 

75. 

Lever,  Charles,  J.  R.  L.  reads  the 
novels  of,  i.  380. 

Liberator,  The,  i.  186  ;  mouthpiece  of 
W.  L.  Garrison,  192 ;  H.  G.  Otis 
enquires  into,  258. 

Liberty  Bell,  The,  J.  R.  L.  and  M. 
W.  L.  contribute  to,  i.  180  ;  its 
sound  haunts  J.  R.  L.,  295. 

"  Library  of  Old  Authors,"  ii.  77. 

Lichfield,  ii.  156. 

Lincoln,  Abraham,  J.  R.  L.  prefers 
Seward  to,  ii.  18  ;  characterized  at 
the  outset  by  J.  R.  L.,  19  ;  election 
of,  does  not  change  the  arguments 
of  Republican  party,  23  ;  J.  R.  L. 
disappointed  in  his  public  utter 
ances,  25  ;  caution  of,  27;  J.  R.  L.'s 
impatience  at,  29  ;  poetized  as  the 
ideaPcaptain,  43  ;  estimate  of,  by 
J.  R.  L.,  50;  contrasted  with  McClel- 
lan,  55 ;  reelection  of,  57  ;  death 
of,  noted  by  J.  R.  L.,  62  ;  character 
ized  in  Commemoration  Ode,  70-73. 

Lincoln,  England,  ii.  156. 

Lippitt,  George  Warren,  i.  45. 

Literature,  J.  R.  L.'s  introduction  to, 
i.  31  ;  his  beginnings  in  production 
of,  91  ;  his  views  on  nationality  in, 
as  expressed  in  the  Pioneer,  103  ; 
and  in  the  North  American,  291 ;  J. 
R.  L.  on,  as  a  subject  for  teaching, 
388 ;  the  basis  of  J.  R.  L.'s  criti 
cal  work,  ii.  87  ;  J.  R.  L.  on  honesty 
in,  131  ;  honored  by  representatives 
at  foreign  courts,  260.  See  American 
Literature. 

Little,  Brown,  &  Co.,  publishers  of  the 
British  Poets,  i.  364 ;   as  publishers 
for    Euierson,  452  ;    undertake    an 
edition  of  Old   Dramatists,    under  | 
editorship  of  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  78,  note. 

Littre",  Maximilien  Paul  fimile,  C.  E. 
Norton  gives  J.  R.  L.  a  letter  to,  ii. 
159. 

Locke,  John,  studied  by  J.  R.  L.  dur 
ing  his  suspension  from  college,  i. 
47-49. 

Longfellow,  Mrs.  Frances  Appleton, 
her  early  encouragement  of  J.  R.  L., 
i.  97. 

Longfellow,  Henry  Wadsworth,  home 


of,  in  Cambridge,  i.  3 ;  his  "  Psalm 
of  Life,"  74 ;  one  of  the  editors  of 
an  annual,  93  ;  his  "  Poems  on  Slav 
ery"  noticed  in  the  Pioneer,  105; 
attacked  by  Poe,  164  ;  J.  R.  L.  to, 
on  Christ  and  Christianity,  169  ; 
notes  in  his  diary  J.  R.  L.'s  en 
thusiasm,  177  ;  his  relation  to  anti- 
slavery  commented  on  by  J.  R.  L., 
183,  197  ;  in  A  Fable  for  Critics, 
243,  245  ;  hears  part  of  the  book 
read,  251 ;  characterized  in  it,  254 ; 
sees  the  Lowells  in  Lenox,  273  ;  his 
"  Kavanagh,"  reviewed  by  J.  R.  L., 
291  ;  his  "  Tales  of  a  Wayside  Inn," 
301  ;  entertains  J.  R.  L.,  Clough, 
and  others,  346;  notes  J.  R.  L.'s 
novel,  348  ;  contributes  to  Putnam1  s 
Monthly,  350  ;  comments  on  M.  W. 
L.,  356  ;  writes  "  The  Two  Angels," 
362 ;  hears  Lowell  lecture,  373  ; 
gives  up  the  Smith  professorship, 
375  ;  has  J.  R.  L.  for  successor,  376; 
bids  him  good-by  on  his  leave  for 
Europe,  378 ;  sees  him  off,  379 ;  sees 
him  on  his  return  at  Nahant,  385  ; 
dines  with  Mr.  Phillips,  411  ;  inter 
ested  in  the  Atlantic,  413 ;  has  no 
desire  to  start  a  magazine,  419  ;  his 
importance  to  the  Atlantic,  420  ; 
dines  with  the  Atlantic  Club,  447. 
His  "  Miles  Standish  "  comment 
ed  on  by  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  75  ;  Dante  Club 
formed  by  him,  84 ;  his  translation 
reviewed  by  J.  R.  L.  and  C.  E.  Nor 
ton,  113  ;  characterized  by  J.  R.  L., 
114  ;  his  scholarship,  115  ;  his  In 
troduction  to  "  Tales  of  a  Wayside 
Inn,"  175  ;  offered  the  mission  to 
England,  203 ;  talks  of  J.  R.  L.  in 
the  same  position,  216 ;  bust  of, 
unveiled  in  Westminster  Abbey, 
305 ;  characterized,  3G5. 

Look  Before  and  After,  A,  ii.  122. 

Loring,  Charles  Greely,  J.  R.  L.  en 
ters  the  office  of,  i.  70. 

Loring,  George  Bailey,  an  early  com 
panion  of  J.  R.  L.,  i.  38  ;  his  career, 
39  ;  J.  R.  L.'s  letters  to,  in  college 
days,  39-42,  51^56  ;  takes  up  study 
of  medicine,  66  ;  letters  of  J.  R.  L. 
to,  on  choice  of  a  profession,  C6,  68- 
70  ;  J.  R.  L.  sends  autobiographic 
verses  to,  73-75  ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on 
Prometheus,  119. 


46G 


INDEX 


"  Lost  Occasion,  The,"  by  Whittier,  i. 
120. 

Louis  Philippe,  portrayed  by  J.  R.  L., 
i.  204,  205. 

Louvain,  ii.  170. 

Lowell,  Anna  Cabot,  wife  of  Charles 
Lowell,  characterized,  i.  42 ;  letter 
of,  to  J.  R.  L.,  52,  note  ;  attracts  J. 
R.  L.  to  the  Beverly  shore,  305. 

Lowell,  Blanche,  first  child  of  J.  R.  L. 
and  M.  W.  L.,  born,  i.  178  ;  J.  R.  L. 
on  training  of,  179 ;  her  infancy  de 
scribed  by  J.  R.  L.,  181 ;  her  inter 
ruption  of  her  father,  194  ;  is  taken 
to  Stockbridge  for  her  health,  272  ; 
dies,  273. 

Lowell,  Rev.  Charles,  buys  Elinwood, 
i.  6  ;  his  descent,  6 ;  his  education 
and  travels,  7 ;  his  pastorate  of 
West  Church,  7-9;  characteristics,  7, 
8;  his  life  at  Elurwood,  8,  9;  his 
interview  with  Mrs.  Dall,  10  ;  visits 
the  Orkneys,  11 ;  becomes  acquainted 
with  Harriet  Brackett  Spence,  12 ; 
his  creed,  12  ;  takes  J.  R.  L.  with 
him  on  his  parochial  journeys,  20  ; 
writes  a  letter  of  advice  to  J.  R.  L. 
about  his  college  course,  43  ;  makes 
a  journey  abroad,  44  ;  writes  to  J. 
R.  L.  about  Harvardiana,  44;  re 
turns  from  Europe,  91  ;  his  action 
in  resigning  his  salary,  234,  note  ; 
retires  from  active  charge  of  his 
parish,  270  ;  his  grief  over  Blanche's 
death,  273  ;  described  by  Miss 
Bremer,  298  ;  at  the  burial  of  Rose, 
304 ;  is  stricken  with  paralysis,  316 ; 
letter  to,  of  concern  from  J.  R.  L., 
316 ;  letter  to,  from  J.  R.  L.  about 
Roman  sights,  321  ;  about  private 
theatricals,  331  ;  about  his  grand 
children,  334  ;  about  Ely,  343  ;  is 
described  by  Clough,  347  ;  deaf  and 
excitable,  361  ;  death  of,  454,  note. 

Lowell,  Charles  Russell,  oldest  bro 
ther  of  J.  R.  L.,  i.  13  ;  his  advisers, 
42. 

Lowell,  Charles  Russell,  Jr.,  goes  to 
the  Adirondacks  with  J.  R.  L.,  i. 
405. 

Lowell,  Frances  Dunlap.  See  Dunlap, 
Frances  ;  characterized  by  J.  R.  L., 
i.  404  ;  by  W.  J.  Stillman,  402,  406  ; 
by  W.  D.  Howells,  403;  by  Mrs.  S. 
B.  Herrick,  404  ;  on  composition  of 


Commemoration  Ode,  ii.  66,  note; 
goes  with  J.  R.  L.  to  Europe,  150  ; 
stays  in  Paris  when  he  goes  to  Lon 
don,  168  ;  studies  Italian  with  J.  R. 
L.,  171  ;  returns  with  J.  R.  L.  to 
America,  182 ;  how  she  received  the 
proposal  of  a  foreign  mission,  218  ; 
sails  with  J.  R.  L.  for  Liverpool, 


220  ;    reaches    Madrid,    2 


goes 


with  J.  R.  L.  to  Greece,  237  ;  re 
turns  with  him  to  Madrid,  238  ;  pro 
poses  to  stay  at  Tours  while  J.  R.  L. 
goes  home,  249 :  is  taken  ill,  250 ; 
begins  slowly  to  recover,  251 ;  is 
pleased  with  J.  R.  L.'s  transfer  to 
England,  256;  has  a  relapse,  257; 
is  removed  to  England,  258 ;  her 
iiivalidism  affects  J.  R.  L.'s  hospi 
tality,  266  ;  her  thanksgiving  dinner, 
267 ;  remains  at  home  while  J.  R. 
L.  visits  the  continent,  270;  death 
of,  319. 

Lowell,  Francis  Cabot,  founder  of 
Lowell,  Massachusetts,  i.  6. 

Lowell,  Mrs.  Harriet  Brackett  Spence, 
of  Orkney  descent,  i.  11 ;  her  north 
ern  temperament,  12 ;  her  first  ac 
quaintance  with  her  husband,  13  ; 
her  children,  13,  14 ;  her  disorder, 
91 ;  her  death,  305. 

Lowell,  James  Jackson,  goes  to  the 
Adirondacks  with  J.  R.  L.,  i.  405  ; 
wounded,  ii.  30;  his  gallant  action, 
31. 

Lowell,  James  Russell,  birth  and  death 
of,  i.  1 ;  his  appreciation  of  his  birth, 
place,  1 ;  his  ancestry,  6  ;  his  fa 
ther,  6-10  ;  his  mother,  11,  12 ;  his 
brothers  and  sisters,  13-15;  his  re 
collections  of  childhood,  15-18; 
hears  of  John  Adams's  death,  19 ; 
visits  Portsmouth  and  Washington, 
19  ;  drives  with  his  father  on  his 
parochial  journeys,  20;  so  gets  ac 
quainted  with  pristine  New  Eng 
land,  20  ;  his  first  schooling,  21  ;  his 
companions,  21,  22 ;  attends  Wil 
liam  Wells' s  school,  22-24  ;  tells 
stories  and  reads  Scott,  24 ;  enters 
Harvard,  26  ;  his  immaturity  in  col 
lege,  30  ;  his  browsings  among  books, 
30-33;  his  intimacy  with  W.  H. 
Shackford,  33  ;  his  letters  to  Shack- 
ford,  34-38  ;  change  in  handwriting, 
37  ;  his  friendship  with  G.  B.  Lor- 


INDEX 


467 


ing,  38,  39  ;  letters  to  Loring,  39- 
42  ;  becomes  editor  of  Harvardiana, 
44;  is  suspended  from  college,  47; 
goes  to  Concord  in  consequence,  48  ; 
meets  Emerson  there,  49  ;  makes  a 
friend  in  E.  R.  Hoar,  50  ;  letters 
to  Loring,  51-56 ;  defends  himself 
against  the  charge  of  indolence, 
52;  works  at  Class  Poem,  51,  53, 54, 
56 ;  writes  an  exculpatory  letter  to 
Emerson,  58;  wishes  to  go  abroad, 
62 ;  weighs  the  professions  of  minis 
try  and  law,  G2  ;  his  attitude  toward 
the  ministry,  63 ;  his  need  of  a  live 
lihood,  65  ;  takes  up  and  abandons 
law,  65  ;  thinks  of  going  into  a  store, 
66 ;  takes  his  brother  Robert's  place , 
67  ;  studies  the  art  of  poetry,  67 ; 
delivers  a  lecture,  67  ;  is  in  miser 
able  dubiety,  68;  resumes  the  study 
of  law,  69  ;  enters  Mr.  Loring:s  of 
fice,  70  ;  his  disappointment  in  love 
an  explanation  of  his  vacillation,  71 ; 
finds  expression  in  verse,  73-75 ; 
meets  Maria  White,  76;  translation 
of  experience  in  verse,  82-85;  is  in 
troduced  by  her  to  the  Band,  89; 
takes  up  writing  as  a  means  of  sup 
port,  91  ;  writes  for  Southern  Liter-  \ 
ary  Messenger,  92 ;  publishes  A 
Year's  Life,  93  ;  proposes  a  life  of 
Keats,  95  ;  writes  to  Duyckinck,  95  ; 
contributes  to  the  Boston  Miscel 
lany,  98  ;  reckons  his  resources,  99 ; 
projects  the  Pioneer,  99  ;  associates  j 
himself  with  R.  Carter  in  the  issue  j 
of  the  magazine,  100 ;  the  spirit  | 
that  prompted  him,  102  ;  his  princi-  I 
pies  as  displayed  in  the  Introduction  j 
to  the  Pioneer,  103-105  ;  whom  he  j 
drew  to  his  side,  105  ;  his  attitude 
toward  Anti-slavery,  105 ;  goes  to 
New  York  for  his  eyes,  107  ;  his 
course  of  life  there,  109  ;  meets  N. 
P.  Willis,  111 ;  undergoing  opera 
tions,  113  ;  forms  a  friendship  with 
C.  F.  Briggs,  114;  returns  to  Cam 
bridge,  114  ;  after  failure  of  the  Pi 
oneer,  returns  to  poetry,  114  ;  paint 
ed  by  Page,  115  ;  his  relations  to 
Page  and  Briggs,  116,  117;  publishes  j 
a  volume  of  Poems,  118  ;  puts  his 
radicalism  into  poetry,  121 ;  is  auto 
biographic  also,  125  ;  introduces  wit 
and  humor,  128 ;  works  over  gome 


old  material  and  new  into  Conver 
sations  on  Some  of  the  Old  Poets, 
132  ;  his  reference  in  it  to  contem 
poraries,  135  ;  his  enquiry  in  it  into 
the  nature  of  poetry,  137  ;  his  atti 
tude  in  it  toward  formal  religion, 
140 ;  his  vision  of  the  inner  verity 
of  religion,  145  ;  his  poetic  disclosure 
of  faith,  146 ;  his  conception  of  the 
function  of  the  poet,  149  ;  publica 
tion  of  Conversations,  150 ;  marriage 
to  Maria  White,  150  ;  goes  to  Phila 
delphia,  152  ;  undertakes  work  on 
the  Pennsylvania  Freeman,  152 ; 
writes  of  his  daily  life  to  Carter, 
152-155 ;  proposes  to  contribute  to 
the  Broadway  Journal,  157  ;  sends  a 
"  letter  to  Matthew  Trueman,"  158; 
which  is  declined,  159  ;  sends  poems 
and  criticisms,  1GO  ;  writes  for  Gra 
ham's  Magazine,  161  ;  writes  a 
sketch  of  Poe,  162  ;  comments  on 
Poe,  163-167  ;  breathes  the  air  ol 
anti-slavery,  168 ;  sends  stanzas  to 
Boston  Courier,  168;  his  articles 
in  Pennsylvania  Freeman,  169, 173 ; 
visits  the  Davis  family,  173 ;  re 
turns  to  Cambridge,  173  ;  writes  his 
verses  On  the  Capture  of  Fugitive 
Slaves  near  Washington,  174 ;  his 
attitude  toward  disunion,  175 ;  be 
comes  distinctly  a  man  of  letters, 
176  ;  he  and  Mrs.  Lowell  fall  heirs 
to  property,  177  ;  his  indifference  to 
wealth,  177  and  note  ;  proposes  a 
sojourn  abroad,  178;  birth  of  his 
first  born,  178  ;  his  reflections  be 
fore  her  birth,  179  ;  contributions 
to  Liberty  Bell,  180 ;  writes  to  Briggs 
about  Blanche,  181;  studies  French, 
182  ;  discusses  the  suppression  of 
Longfellow's  "  Poems  on  Slavery," 
183,  184  ;  his  views  on  the  education 
of  Blanche,  185  ;  contributes  to  the 
London  Daily  News,  186;  his  judg 
ment  of  Garrison,  187-190  ;  writes 
Lines  on  the  Death  of  Charles  Turner 
Torrey,  191;  becomes  a  contributor 
to  the  National  Anti-Slavery  Stand 
ard,  193;  writes  to  S.  H.  Gay  on  his 
proposed  close  connection  with  that 
journal,  194-200;  writes  his  first 
Bigloiv  Paper,  201 ;  contributes  a 
paper  to  Standard  on  Daniel  Web 
ster,  201 ;  becomes  "  corresponding 


468 


INDEX 


editor"  of  the  Standard,  202;  his 
salary  for  this,  202;  his  Ode  to 
France  his  first  regular  contribu 
tion,  204  ;  his  article  on  The  French 
Revolution  of  1848,  204  ;  continues 
the  discussion,  205  ;  his  verses  To 
Lamartine,  206  ;  writes  an  article 
Shall  we  ever  be  Republicans,  207  ; 
his  conceit  of  The  Sacred  Parasol, 
209  ;  the  reenforcement  he  brought 
to  the  Anti-slavery  camp,  211 ;  is 
doubtful  about  his  service,  212 ; 
writes  on  The  Nominations  for  the 
Presidency,  213 ;  writes  An  Im 
aginary  Conversation,  215  ;  his  com 
ment  on  Jefferson,  218,  note  ;  his 
interest  in  public  men,  219;  espe 
cially  in  Webster,  220 ;  his  articles 
on  this  statesman,  220-227  ;  the  po 
ems  he  contributed  to  the  Standard, 
227,  228;  his  relations  to  the  anti- 
slavery  leaders,  228-232 ;  accepts  a 
modification  of  his  connection  with 
the  Standard,  233;  close  of  his  en 
gagement,  234;  the  part  he  had 
played,  235, 23G  ;  the  worth  his  con 
nection  had  been  to  him,  236;  his 
charity  toward  friends  and  oppo 
nents,  237  ;  begins  on  A  Fable  for 
Critics,  238 ;  sends  specimens  to 
Briggs,  239  ;  promises  the  book  as 
a  New  Year's  gift,  240;  advises  as 
to  publication,  241  ;  is  amused  over 
Briggs's  disposition  of  anticipated 
profits,  243;  insists  upon  the  free 
dom  of  the  gift,  244 ;  reports  pro 
gress,  245 ;  explains  origin  of  pas 
sage  on  bores,  246  ;  finishes  the  book, 
247  ;  gives  direction  about  title-page, 
249;  his  after  judgment  of  the  poem, 
252  ;  shows  his  independence  in  it, 
254  ;  and  his  nature  generally,  255  ; 
his  Biglow  Papers,  255  ;  wishes  he 
ha&usedanomdeplnme,  256;  gives 
his  views  on  the  political  condition 
which  gave  rise  to  the  book,  257  ! 
his  two  poems  suggested  by  Garri 
son  and  the  Liberator,  258-2GO ; 
questions  the  bad  spelling  of  Hosea, 
261 ;  collects  the  papers  into  a  vol 
ume,  262  ;  proposes  an  external  fit 
ness,  263 ;  writes  of  the  success  of 
the  book,  264;  discloses  his  person 
ality  in  it,  265 ;  writes  The  Vision 
of  Sir  Launfal,  266;  hia  concep 


tion  of  his  poetry,  267  ;  is  the  poet 
of  June,  269 ;  his  whist  club,  271  ; 
goes  to  Stockbridge,  272 ;  loses  hia 
child  Blanche,  273  ;  attempts  tra 
gedy,  274;  writes  to  Carter  at  Pep- 
perell,  274  ;  writes  to  Briggs  of  the 
preparation  of  a  volume  of  poems, 
276  ;  his  seclusion,  280 ;  confesses 
impecuniosity,  281  ;  his  effort  to 
help  Hawthorne,  283  ;  meditates  a 
magazine,  287 ;  writes  to  Theodore 
Parker  on  contributions  to  the  Mas 
sachusetts  Quarterly,  288 ;  contri 
butes  papers  to  the  North  Ameri 
can,  290  ;  writes  to  Briggs  respecting 
American  society,  296  ;  on  current 
English  writers,  297;  is  described 
in  his  home  by  Miss  Bremer,  298; 
issues  his  Poems  in  two  volumes, 
299;  proposes  The  Nooning,  300; 
his  views  on  his  poetic  vocation, 
302 ;  defends  his  sister  on  the  Hun 
garian  question,  304  ;  loses  his  child 
Rose,  304;  and  his  mother,  305; 
birth  of  his  child  Walter,  305;  jests 
on  the  boy's  birthday,  306  ;  plans 
for  a  year  in  Europe,  307  ;  sails  with 
his  family,  309 ;  describes  voyage, 
309;  halts  at  Malta,  314;  describes 
his  life  at  Florence,  315 ;  hears  of 
his  father's  illness,  316  ;  leaves  for 
Rome,  317 ;  describes  arrival  in 
Rome,  318  ;  joins  English  and  Amer 
ican  friends,  320 ;  compares  Roman 
with  Lombard  churches,  321 ;  visits 
the  Campagna,  322  ;  describes  his 
Christmas  in  Rome,  323  ;  criticises 
Roman  architecture,  327;  comments 
on  the  people  he  sees,  328 ;  de 
scribes  his  habit  of  studying  pic 
tures,  330 ;  takes  part  in  private 
theatricals,  331 ;  writes  their  grand 
father  of  his  children,  334  ;  loses  hia 
only  son,  338 ;  describes  Easter  Sun 
day,  339  ;  his  final  impressions  of 
Rome,  342 ;  makes  an  excursion  to 
Subiaco,  343  ;  travels  to  Naples,  343; 
is  in  England,  345;  takes  passage 
for  America,  345 ;  makes  the  ac 
quaintance  on  shipboard  of  Thack 
eray  and  C'ough,  346  ;  his  opinion  of 
dough's  "  Bothie,"  347  ;  projects  a 
novel,  347 ;  abandons  the  attempt, 
348 ;  begins  Our  Own  for  Putnam's 
Monthly,  351 ;  contributes  A  Moose- 


INDEX 


469 


head  Journal,  353 ;  and  Cambridge 
Thirty  Years  Ago,  354;  interests 
himself  in  Underwood's  magazine, 
355  ;  loses  his  wife,  357  ;  has  dreams 
of  her  and  Walter,  358  ;  prints  her 
poems,  359  ;  his  solitude,  361 ;  takes 
comfort  in  his  daughter,  363  ;  en 
gages  in  literary  jobs,  364 ;  spends  a 
summer  in  Beverly,  365 ;  makes  the 
acquaintance  of  Stillman,  367 ; 
writes  Ode  to  Happiness,  368;  lec 
tures  on  poetry  before  the  Lowell 
Institute,  370 ;  is  appointed  suc 
cessor  to  Longfellow  in  the  Smith 
professorship  at  Harvard,  376  ;  goes 
West  on  a  lecturing  tour,  378;  has 
a  farewell  dinner  given  him,  378; 
sails  for  Havre,  380 ;  goes  to  Paris 
and  Chartres,  380  ;  to  London,  381  ; 
settles  in  Dresden  for  autumn  and 
winter,  381  ;  takes  lessons  in  Ger 
man  and  Spanish,  382  ;  goes  to  Italy 
in  the  spring,  383  ;  returns  to  Dres 
den  and  to  America,  384 ;  estab 
lishes  himself  at  Dr.  Howe's,  384 ; 
takes  up  his  college  work,  385 ;  dis 
courses  on  philology  and  esthetics, 
386;  on  the  modern  languages  com 
pared  with  the  ancient  as  disciplin 
ary  studies,  387  ;  the  character  of 
his  teaching,  388  ;  his  interest  in  lit 
erature  as  compelling  force,  389 ;  his 
indebtedness  to  Dante,  390  ;  his  re 
lation  to  students,  391  ;  his  use  of 
object  -  aids,  392 ;  his  manner  in 
teaching,  393;  his  indifference  to 
academic  routine,  395;  the  generos 
ity  of  his  teaching-gifts,  39G;  his  hos 
pitality  to  his  students,  398  ;  what 
he  got  from  his  teaching,  399;  ef 
fect  of  academic  life  on  productive 
ness,  400 ;  second  marriage,  401  ; 
comments  on  his  wife  and  her  fam 
ily,  401,  402;  goes  to  the  Adiron- 
dacks,  404  ;  his  appreciation  of  wild 
life,  405  ;  his  attitude  toward  poetry, 
406  ;  asked  to  edit  a  magazine,  408  ; 
goes  to  dine  with  M.  D.  Phillips, 
411  ;  becomes  editor  of  the  Atlantic, 
412;  makes  it  a  condition  that  Dr. 
Holmes  shall  contribute,  413  ;  writes 
to  Emerson  on  his  contributions, 
414;  and  to  Whittier,  417  ;  writes 
regarding  terms  of  payment,  421  ; 
to  R.  G.  White  on  anonymity,  422  ; 


compares  the  situation  with  that  of 
a  later  date,  423;  upon  the  inde 
pendence  of  the  magazine,  424  ;  his 
qualifications  for  his  post,  425;  his 
editorial  function  compared  with 
that  of  his  successors,  427  ;  his  atti 
tude  toward  contributors,  428 ;  his 
weariness  of  his  routine,  429;  his 
regard  for  criticism,  430;  his  own 
work  as  reviewer,  432 ;  his  thor 
oughness,  433  ;  his  injection  of  fun, 
434  ;  his  proposal  to  dictate  five  love- 
stories  at  once,  437;  writes  a  Larnb- 
ish  letter  to  Captain  Parker,  438  ; 
his  impatience  over  details,  441  ;  his 
respect  for  proof-reading,  444  ;  his 
loss  of  spontaneity,  445  ;  his  diver 
sion,  446  ;  goes  to  club  dinners,  447  ; 
his  critical  faculty,  449  ;  concerned 
over  the  transfer  of  the  Atlantic, 
450;  gives  his  judgment  of  Ticknor 
&  Fields,  451 ;  yields  editorship  of 
Atlantic  to  Mr.  Fields,  453  ;  returns 
to  Elmwood  to  live,  453 ;  views  on 
his  own  poetry,  454. 

Writes  a  political  paper  for  the  At 
lantic  jointly  with  Mr.  Godwin,  ii.  4 ; 
does  not  reprint  it,  5 ;  the  qualities  of 
thepaper,13;  writes  apaperon^ner- 
ican  Tract  Society,  13 ;  and  two  on 
Choate  and  Cushing,  14  ;  his  main 
contention  in  these  papers,  1 6 ;  iden 
tifies  himself  with  Republican  party, 
17  ;  prefers  Seward  to  Lincoln,  18; 
his  first  characterization  of  Lincoln, 
19  ;  his  uncertainty  as  to  results,  20  ; 
writes  on  The  Question  of  Uie  Hour, 
20 ;  and  on  secession,  23  ;  disap 
pointed  in  Lincoln's  public  utter 
ances,  25 ;  writes  on  the  English  at 
titude,  27 ;  his  private  views  on 
Lincoln,  29 ;  is  anxious  for  his 
nephews,  30  ;  cannot  write  Biglows, 
32 ;  writes  The  Washers  of  the 
Shroud,  33  ;  his  refreshment  in  na 
ture,  34  ;  writes  the  first  of  the  sec 
ond  series  of  Biglow  Papers,  34; 
the  ease  with  which  he  assumes  the 
Yankee  dialect,  35  ;  his  greater  firm 
ness  in  his  second  series,  ,36  ;  the 
earnestness  of  his  tone,  37 ;  his 
playing  at  old  age,  38  ;  writes  Ma 
son  and  Slidell,  40  ;  and  Sunthin' 
in  the  Pastoral  Line,  41  ;  writes  his 
ode  to  the  memory  of  Shaw,  42  ;  his 


470 


INDEX 


passion  for  freedom,  44 ;  undertakes 
with  Mr.  Norton  the  editorship  of 
the  North  American  Review,  45  ;  is 
whimsically  indignant  over  the  an 
nouncement,  47 ;  writes  to  Mr. 
Motley  for  an  article,  48  ;  stirred  to 
action  by  Mr.  Norton,  49 ;  writes  on 
The  President's  Policy,  50 ;  con 
fesses  his  earlier  doubt  about  Lin 
coln,  50  ;  his  greater  confidence  in 
him,  51 ;  criticises  McClellan,52;  re- 
examines  the  causes  of  the  war,  53  ; 
compares  the  candidates  for  the 
presidency,  55  ;  exults  in  the  pro 
mise  of  success,  57  ;  finds  expression 
in  verse  and  prose,  58 ;  forecasts 
reconstruction,  59  ;  rejoices  over  the 
end  of  the  war,  60 ;  attacks  the 
problem  of  reconstruction,  61 ; 
writes  of  Lincoln's  death,  62  ;  called 
on  to  write  his  Commemoration  Ode, 
63  ;  is  wasted  by  the  work,  64  ;  com 
ments  on  the  structure  of  the  ode, 
66  ;  delivers  it,  69  ;  his  conception 
in  it  of  Lincoln,  71  ;  his  recognition 
finally  of  Lincoln's  greatness,  72 ; 
finds  in  him  the  new  American,  73  ; 
his  familiar  letters,  74 ;  comments 
on  "  Miles  Standish,"  75  ;  studies 
Spanish,  76  ;  makes  his  editing  and 
teaching  help  each  other,  77  ;  edits 
a  volume  of  Old  Dramatists,  78, 
note ;  his  loyalty  to  New  England 
and  America,  79  ;  his  characteriza 
tion  of  his  ancestors,  81  ;  dines  with 
Trollope,  82  ;  meets  with  the  Dante 
Club,  84  ;  his  relations  to  the  whole 
field  of  intellectual  life,  85  ;  his 
discourses  on  literature,  87  ;  his 
originality,  88;  his  personality  in 
criticism,  89 ;  reflex  judgment  on 
Carlyle,  89;  criticises  poetry  in 
Swinburne,  92  ;  his  treatment  of 
President  Johnson,  93  ;  his  poetry 
carries  farther  than  his  prose,  94 ; 
entertains  Cranch,  95  ;  writes  on  the 
weather,  96  ;  reflects  on  his  person 
ality,  99  ;  makes  new  arrangements 
with  the  college,  100  ;  edits  Dryden, 
101 ;  considers  a  biography  of  Haw 
thorne,  102  ;  writes  to  a  friend  on 
some  points  of  speech,  103 ;  writes 
Fitz  Adam's  Story,  104 ;  sends  a 
fairy  tale  and  poem  to  Our  Young 
Folks,  105;  writes  The  Seward- 


Johnson  Reaction,  107  ;  writes  on 
Percival,  109  ;  his  views  on  impeach 
ment,  109,  note  ;  finds  a  likeness  to 
his  own  experience  in  Lessing,  110  ; 
his  use  of  lectures  in  his  essay-work, 
111 ;  his  personality  in  his  writing, 
112  ;  reviews  Longfellow's  transla 
tion  of  Dante,  113  ;  his  views  on 
translations,  114 ;  his  appearance  at 
Elmwood,  115  ;  writes  A  June  Idyll, 
116  ;  collects  a  volume  of  his  poetry, 
118;  struggles  over  its  title,  119; 
gives  expression  to  himself  in  two 
essays,  121 ;  is  burdened  with  the 
North  American,  122  ;  receives  con 
gratulations  on  Under  the  Willows, 
125  ;  is  interested  in  young  writers, 
127  ;  writes  a  letter  of  encourage 
ment,  129  :  writes  on  literary  hon 
esty,  131  ;  interests  himself  in  the 
letters  and  journals  of  a  Virginian, 
135 ;  his  sympathy  with  Southerners, 
136  ;  senjls  his  daughter  abroad  with 
Mr.  and  Mrs.  Fields,  137  ;  is  near 
being  sent  as  minister  to  Spain,  138; 
writes  The  Cathedral,  139  ;  defends 
his  use  of  a  word,  140  ;  his  happiness 
in  writing  his  poem,  142  ;  his  hatred 
of  debt,  143;  refuses  to  do  hack 
work,  144 ;  lectures  at  Cornell,  145  •, 
makes  the  acquaintance  of  T. 
Hughes,  145 ;  thanks  R.  G.  White 
for  a  dedication,  146  ;  sells  part  of 
his  estate,  147  ;  finds  relief  in  this, 
148  ;  thanks  Mr.  Fields  for  "  Yes 
terdays  with  Authors,"  149  ;  sails  for 
Europe  with  Mrs.  Lowell,  150  ;  lands 
in  Queenstown,  151 ;  visits  Killar- 
ney,  152  ;  and  Chester,  153  ;  is  in 
lodgings  in  London,  154;  makes  a 
tour  in  the  north,  156  ;  and  in  the 
west,  157  ;  joins  the  Nortons  in 
Paris,  158  ;  picks  up  books,  160 ; 
works  at  Old  French,  162  ;  has  John 
Holmes  for  a  companion,  163  ;  pro 
poses  to  visit  London  to  bid  the 
Nortons  good-by,  165  ;  is  decorated 
with  D.  C.  L.  at  Oxford,  169  ;  en 
route  to  Italy,  170  ;  is  charmed  with 
Venice,  171  ;  considers  a  return  to 
his  professorship,  172  ;  writes  Agas 
sis,  174 ;  defends  his  poem,  176 ; 
goes  to  Rome  where  he  is  with 
Story,  179  ;  at  Naples,  180  ;  returns 
to  Paris,  181 ;  and  to  London,  183  ; 


INDEX 


471 


is  decorated  at  Cambridge,  184  ; 
returns  to  America,  184 ;  spends  the 
summer  at  home,  186  ;  works  at  Old 
French,  187  ;  writes  an  article  on 
Spenser,  188  ;  writes  Concord  and 
Old  Elm  odes,  189  ;  shows  his  patri 
otism  in  Fourth  of  July  ode,  190 ; 
writes  bitter  verses  for  the  Nation, 

191  ;  calls  out  thereby  cheap  wrath, 

192  ;  defends  himself  in  a  letter  to 
Joel  Benton,  193  ;  publishes  second 
series  of  Among  my  Books,   196  ; 
refers  to  Mr.  Wilkinson's  criticism, 
197  ;  writes  on  Swift,  198  ;  his  in 
terest  in  national  politics,  200  ;  pre 
sides  at  a  political  meeting,  201 ;  is 
a  delegate  to  Republican  convention, 
202  ;  is  talked  of  for  a  foreign  mis 
sion,  203  ;   gives  expression  to  his 
political  views,   204;    is    asked   to 
run  for  Congress,  and  put  on  the 
Republican  ticket  as  elector,  205 ; 
makes  a  speech  at   a  caucus,  206  ; 
gives  vent  to  his  faith  and  doubts  in 
Fourth  of  July  ode,  212;  publishes 
Three  Memorial  Poems,  213 ;   goes 
to  Baltimore  with  F.   J.  Child  to 
lecture  at  the  Johns  Hopkins,  213  ; 
is  entertained,  214;  writes  a  sonnet 
to  Miss  Alice  Gilman,  215  ;  is  urged 
as  elector  to  vote  for  Tilden,  216  ;  is 
asked  to  accept  the  mission  to  Aus 
tria,  217  ;  declines  and  is  given  that 
to  Spain,   218;    meets  Mr.    Hayes, 
219 ;    sails    with    Mrs.   Lowell  for 
Liverpool,  220  ;  his  real  preparation 
for  his  office,  221 ;  his  official  con 
sciousness,  223 ;  his  dislike  of  busi 
ness,  226;  arrives  with  Mrs.  Lowell 
at    Madrid,   227  ;    is    presented    at 
Court,  227  ;  finds  pleasant  quarters, 
228;    his    early  diplomatic    duties, 
229  ;  writes  of  the  marriage  of  the 
king,   230 ;    witnesses  a  bull-fight, 
234  ;  buys  books,  236  ;  takes  a  two 
months'    leave    of    absence,    237  ; 
visits  Constantinople,  238;  writes  of 
the  Queen's  illness  and  death,  239  ; 
devotes    himself    to    the    study  of 
Spanish,    241;    writes    of    internal 
affairs,  242  ;  his  opinion  as  to  the 
future  of  Spain,  245  ;  receives  Gen 
eral  Grant,  247  ;  a  judgment  on  the 
Spanish,    248 ;     proposes    a    flying 
visit  to  America,  249  ;  is  stayed  by 


his  wife's  illness,  250  ;  which  proves 
nearly  fatal,  251 ;  sends  a  despatch 
on  the  change  of  ministry,  253 ; 
writes  on  the  Cuban  situation,  254 ; 
is  offered  the  English  mission,  255  ; 
is  disturbed  over  his  wife's  condi 
tion,  256;  goes  to  London,  returns 
to  Madrid  arid  removes  his  wife  to 
England,  258 ;  his  training  for  the 
English  mission,  259  ;  a  representa 
tive  of  American  men  of  letters, 
260 ;  his  friendly  reception,  261 ; 
his  championship  of  America,  262 ; 
in  demand  as  an  after-dinner 
speaker,  264 ;  his  embarrassment 
from  his  narrow  means,  265 ;  his 
social  relations,  266  ;  plays  Romeo, 
267  ;  his  official  duties  in  connection 
with  the  assassination  of  President 
Garfield,  268  ;  makes  a  brief  trip 
after  the  death  of  the  President, 
270 ;  visits  Weimar,  271 ;  joins  the 
Fields  at  Venice,  272 ;  makes  a 
brief  stay  at  Paris,  273;  his  judg 
ment  on  Irish  affairs,  274  ;  describes 
the  situation  to  Mr.  Evarts,  277  ; 
writes  on  the  coercion  bill,  280 ; 
criticises  the  bill,  281  ;  his  attitude 
toward  Irish- Americans,  282 ;  lays 
down  a  course  of  action,  284 ;  cor 
responds  with  Mr.  Elaine  on  the 
measures  to  be  taken,  285  ;  is  called 
upon  for  the  facts,  288;  is  de 
nounced  and  defended  at  home,  289 ; 
his  action  recognized  at  home  and 
abroad,  290  ;  compared  with  Lord 
Granville,  291  ;  writes  to  friends  of 
his  difficulties  with  the  Irish,  292  ; 
characterized  by  Mr.  Watts-Dunton, 
293;  reverts  to  poetry,  294;  sends 
poems  to  The  Century,  295  ;  regrets 
the  death  of  R.  H.  Dana,  296  ;  has 
his  portrait  painted,  297  ;  his  per 
plexities  in  presenting  his  country 
women  at  court,  298 ;  makes  a 
speech  on  the  unveiling  of  bust  of 
Fielding,  298  ;  is  candidate  for  rec 
torship  of  St.  Andrews,  299;  with 
draws  his  name,  300 ;  addresses  the 
students  at  St.  Andrews,  301  ;  his 
monomania  on  Jews,  302 ;  unveils 
bust  of  Longfellow,  305 ;  receives 
degree  at  Edinburgh,  306  ;  speaks 
on  the  newspaper,  307 ;  analyzes 
Wordsworth's  power,  309  ;  his  atti- 


472 


INDEX 


tude  toward  the  church,  311;  his 
address  on  Democracy,  313  ;  tenure 
of  his  diplomatic  position,  316  ;  his 
hesitation  about  leaving  England, 
317  ;  is  sounded  about  accepting  a 
professorship  at  Oxford,  318  ;  death 
of  his  wife,  319  ;  his  words  respect 
ing  her,  319,  320;  speaks  on  Cole 
ridge,  321 ;  returns  to  America,  321 ; 
makes  his  home  for  the  time  being 
at  Deerfoot  Farm,  322;  takes  up 
letter-writing  as  an  occupation,  323 ; 
his  dependence  on  women,  324 ; 
goes  to  Washington,  324 ;  begins  to 
feel  his  age,  325 ;  gives  an  address 
at  Chelsea,  326;  is  president  of 
American  Archaeological  Institute, 
326;  attends  a  hearing  on  inter 
national  copyright,  326  ;  addresses 
the  committee,  327-332  ;  writes  an 
epigram  on  the  subject,  333  ;  makes 
an  epigram  on  Gladstone,  334 ;  his 
life  in  London,  335 ;  is  harassed 
by  his  approaching  Harvard  address, 
337  :  annoyed  by  an  interview,  337  ; 
delivers  his  oration  at  Harvard,  338  ; 
edits  letters  of  Landor,  342  ;  makes 
rhymes  for  Mrs.  Gilder,  343,  note ; 
writes  an  introduction  to  "The 
World's  Progress,"  344  ;  his  need  of 
economy,  349  ;  his  reputation,  capi 
tal,  350  ;  goes  to  Chicago  to  give  an 
address  on  Washington's  Birthday, 
351 ;  gives  six  lectures  on  the  Old 
Dramatists  before  the  Lowell  Insti 
tute,  352  ;  sails  for  England  in  spring 
of  1888,  355  ;  his  life  at  Whitby, 
356  ;  is  at  work  on  his  new  volume 
of  poems,  357 ;  doubts  about  his 
work,  358  ;  writes  to  Mrs.  Bell  about 
Feltham,  359 ;  presides  at  an  Au 
thors'  Reading  and  discourses  on 
American  literature,  361  ;  writes 
poems  which  reflect  his  deeper  na 
ture,  368  ;  makes  a  slight  beginning 
on  his  Haivthorne,  372  ;  issues  his 
Political  Essays,  372 ;  utters  vale 
dictories,  373  ;  gives  his  address  on 
The  Independent  in  Politics,  374 ; 
his  faith  in  his  early  ideals,  376; 
makes  a  speech  before  the  Civil 
Service  Reform  Association,  377  ; 
goes  to  England  in  the  spring  of 
1888,  379  ;  attends  commemoration 
at  Bologna  and  receives  a  degree, 


379 ;  is  again  at  Whitby,  380  ;  his 
antidote  to  sleeplessness,  383 ;  visits 
St.  Ives  and  returns  to  London,  384 ; 
writes  to  Misses  Lawrence,  384  ;  re 
turns  to  America  and  spends  the 
whiter  in  Boston,  386  ;  visits  Wash 
ington,  387  ;  celebrates  his  seven 
tieth  birthday,  387;  gives  up  writ 
ing  a  paper  on  John  Bright,  388; 
writes  on  Walton,  389  ;  makes  an 
after-dinner  speech  on  "  Our  Litera 
ture,"  390  ;  makes  a  final  visit  to 
England,  391 ;  writes  The  Brook, 
393 ;  returns  to  Elmwood,  393  ; 
works  at  a  uniform  edition  of  his 
writings,  394 ;  his  judgment  on  his 
early  poems,  395;  suffers  the  first 
severe  illness  of  his  life,  396  ;  writes 
The  Infant  Prodigy,  397;  receives  a 
visit  from  Mr.  Stephen,  398  ;  writes 
of  Milton,  398;  and  of  Parkman, 
399 ;  his  Thou  Spell,  avaunt  !  399  ; 
writes  a  birthday  letter  to  Whittier, 

400  ;   has  books  dedicated  to  him, 

401  ;    writes    of    his    condition   to 
Misses  Lawrence,  402  ;  his  occupa 
tion  in  his  last  days,  406 ;  death  of, 
408. 

Lowell,  James  Russell,  portraits  of, 
by  Page,  i.  115  ;  the  same,  engraved 
by  Hall,  354  ;  by  Sandys  and  Mrs. 
Merritt,  ii.  297. 

Lowell,  John,  founder  of  Lowell  In 
stitute,  i.  6. 

Lowell,  Hon.  John,  grandfather  of  J. 
R.  L.,  i.  6. 

Lowell,  Mabel,  referred  to  as  "  Mab," 
i.  234,  242  ;  born,  274 ;  compared 
with  Blanche,  276  ;  her  experience 
on  shipboard,  311  ;  her  friskiness  in 
Rome,  328  ;  her  theological  views, 
334  ;  her  proficiency  in  Italian,  335  ; 
the  consolation  she  gave  her  father 
after  her  mother's  death,  368  ;  un 
der  charge  of  Miss  Dunlap,  401 ; 
goes  to  Europe  with  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Fields,  ii.  137  ;  her  remark  on  her 
father,  138,  note;  marries  Edward 
Burnett,  150.  See  Burnett,  Mabel 
Lowell. 

Lowell,  Maria  White,  see  White, 
Maria  ;  goes  with  J.  R.  L.  to  Phila 
delphia,  i.  151;  improves  in  health, 
154 ;  writes  to  Mrs.  Hawthorne,  155  ; 
translates  from  the  German,  156; 


INDEX 


473 


tells  fairy  tales  and  sings  ballads, 
175 ;  comes  into  a  share  of  her  fa 
ther's  estate,  177  :  gives  birth  to  her 
first  child,  178 ;  contributes  to  Lib 
erty  Bell,  180  ;  the  color  of  her  eyes, 
185;  advises  introducing  Margaret 
Fuller  into  A  Fable  for  Critics,  245; 
thinks  highly  of  Sir  Launfal,  26G; 
her  frail  appearance,  273;  gives  birth 
to  her  second  child,  274  ;  described 
by  Miss  Bremer,  298  ;  loses  her  third 
child,  304  ;  gives  birth  to  her  fourth, 
305;  goes  to  Europe  with  J.  R.  L., 
309;  describes  their  life  in  Rome, 
320 ;  loses  her  only  son,  338  :  re 
turns  with  J.  R.  L.  to  America,  345 ; 
her  failing  health,  35G  ;  her  death, 
357  ;  her  poetical  work,  358  ;  poems 
of,  printed  by  J.  R.  L.,  359 ;  her 
likeness,  3G1 ;  her  influence  on  J.  R. 
L.,  3G9. 

Lowell,  Mary  Traill  Spence,  afterward 
Mrs.  S.  R.  Putnam,  sister  of  J.  R. 
L.,  i.  13  ;  her  intellectual  force,  14  ; 
her  anxiety  over  the  Pioneer,  106  ; 
writes  on  the  Hungarian  question, 
304  ;  is  in  Dresden  with  J.  R.  L. ,  381 ; 
J.  R.  L.  at  the  home  of,  ii.  322,  38G. 

Lowell,  Percival,  first  of  the  Lowell 
family  in  America,  i.  G. 

Lowell,  Rebecca,  sister  of  J.  R.  L.,  i. 
13 ;  has  charge  of  the  household, 
270 ;  eccentricity  of,  3G1 ;  death  of, 
ii.  150. 

Lowell,  Robert  Traill  Spence,  brother 
of  J.  R.  L.,  i.  12;  his  career  and 
productions,  13,  14,  note  ;  goes 
boating  with  J.  R.  L.,  40. 

Lowell,  Rose,  birth  and  death  of,  i.  304. 

Lowell,  Walter,  birth  of,  i.  305 ;  his 
birthday  commented  on,  30G ;  de 
scribed,  337  ;  death  of,  338. 

Lowell,  William,  i.  13. 

Lowell  Institute,  origin  of,  i.  6  ;  J.  R. 
L.'s  lectures  before,  in  1887,  133 ;  in 
1855,  370  ;  methods  of,  372,  note  ; 
public  censorship  of,  425 ;  J.  R.  L. 
lectures  before,  on  Old  Dramatists, 
ii.  352. 

Lundy,  Benjamin,  i.  152. 

Lyons,  Lord,  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  suzerainty, 
ii.  294. 

Lyttelton,  Lady,  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  Irish 
affairs,  ii.  293  ;  a  friend  in  time  of 
need,  320. 


McCarthy,  Justin,  on  Irish  character 
istics,  ii.  292. 

McClellan,  George  Brinton,  Report  of, 
reviewed  by  J.  R.  L.,_iL_51  ;  char 
acter  of,  analyzed  by  J.  R.  L.,  52 ; 
contrasted  with  Lincoln,  55.. 

McClellan  or  Lincoln,  ii.  55. 

"  McFingal,"  ii.  362. 

McKiin,  James  Miller,  editor  of  Penn 
sylvania  Freeman,  i.  152  ;  Letter  to, 
quoted,  231 ;  the  letter  a  forerun 
ner  of  A  Fable  for  Critics,  250. 

Mallock,  William  Hurrell,  ii.  299. 

Manifest  Destiny,  ii.  15. 

Manning,  Lamb's  letter  to,  i.  438. 

"  Mark  Twain,"  ii.  3G7. 

Marlowe,  Christopher,  ii.  354. 

Marvell,  Andrew,  J.  R.  L.  edits  the 
poems  of,  i.  364. 

Mason  and  Slidell,  ii.  40. 

Massachusetts  Historical  Society, 
Charles  Lowell  secretary  of,  i.  9; 
J.  R.  L.  a  member  of,  446,  note  ;  its 
collections  the  basis  of  an  article  by 
J.  R.  L.,  ii.  79. 

Massachusetts  Quarterly  Review,  The, 
i.  287,  288. 

Mathew,  Father,  a  great  benefactor  of 
Ireland,  ii.  275. 

Matthews,  Cornelius,  "the  centu 
rion,"  i.  242. 

May,  Samuel,  contributor  to  the  Stand- 
ard,  i.  193. 

Memories  Positum  B.  G.  Shaw,  ii. 
42. 

Mercedes,  Queen,  marriage  of,  ii.  230; 
illness  of,  and  death,  239;  J.  R.  L. 
writes  a  sonnet  to,  240. 

Merelo,  Manuel,  ii.  24G. 

Merritt,  Mrs.  Anna  Lea,  paints  J.  R. 
L.'s  portrait,  ii.  297. 

Mexico,  J.  R.  L.  on  the  war  with,  i. 
257 ;  conquest  of,  J.  R.  L.  proposes 
a  tragedy  on,  274 ;  General  Grant's 
visit  to,  ii.  255. 

Michelangelo  and  Petrarch  compared, 
ii.  111. 

Middleton,  Thomas,  The  Plays  of,  i. 
148. 

"  Midsummer  Night's  Dream,"  J.  R. 
L.  plays  parts  in,  i.  331. 

Mifflin,  Thomas,  quartermaster-gen 
eral,  i.  2. 

"  Miles  Standish,"  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii.  75. 

Mill,  The,  i.  228,  232. 


474 


INDEX 


Milnes,  Richard  Monckton,  Mrs.  Proc 
tor  comes  to  the  rescue  of,  ii.  335. 

Milton,  John,  his  "Lycidas,"  ii.  175; 
his  "  Areopagitica  "  introduced  by 
J.  R.  L.,  398. 

"  Minister's  Wooing,"  by  Mrs.  Stowe, 
i.  412;  letter  about,  by  J.  R.  L., 
430;  reviewed  by  J.  R.  L.,  449. 

Minor,  John  Botts,  journal  of,  ii.  135. 

Mirror,  The,  i.  163. 

Misconception,  A,  ii.  205. 

Mr.  Hosea  Biglow^s  Speech  in  March 
Meeting,  ii.  94. 

Mitchell,  Dr.  S.  Weir,  reports  J.  R. 
L.'s  visions,  i.  15  ;  takes  care  of  J. 
R.  L.  at  Bologna,  ii.  379  ;  releases 
him  from  an  engagement,  386;  dedi 
cates  a  volume  to  J.  R.  L.,  401. 

Modern  Language  Association,  J.  R. 
L.  before,  i.  386. 

Moosehead  Journal,  A^i.  353. 

"Morning  Glory,  The,'M.  359. 

"  Mortal  Antipathy,  The,"  i.  413,  note. 

Motley,  John  Lothrop,  dines  with  Mr. 
Phillips,  i.  411  ;  his  importance  to 
the  Atlantic,  420;  J.  R.  L.  asks  him 
to  write  for  the  North  American, 
ii.  48  ;  representative  of  American 
men  of  letters  at  Court  of  St. 
James,  260. 

Miiller,  Max,  his  "  Auld  Lang  Syne  " 
quoted,  ii.  263. 

My  Garden  Acquaintance,  ii.  112 ;  an 
expression  of  J.  R.  L.'s  nature,  121. 

My  Study  Windows,  published,  ii.  145. 

Naples,  J.  R.  L.'s  delight  in  Museum 
at,  ii.  180. 

National  Anti-Slavery  Standard,  The, 
official  paper  of  the  American  Anti- 
Slavery  Society,  i.  192 ;  its  several 
editors,  192  ;  its  list  of  contributors, 
193;  J.  R.  L.'a  early  relations  to, 
196-200  ;  a  close  connection  begun 
with  it  by  J.  R.  L.,  202  ;  contribu 
tions  to  it  by  J.  R.  L.,  203-234 ;  its 
value  to  J.  R.  L.,  235 ;  compared 
with  the  Atlantic,  ii.  3. 

National  literature  ;  see  Literature. 

Neal,  John,  contributor  to  the  Pioneer, 
i.  105;  his  advice  to  J.  R.  L.,  108. 

West,  The,  sent  by  J.  R.  L.  to  Under 
wood  for  his  magazine,  i.  355;  its 
significance,  357. 

New  England,  J.  R.  L.'s  early  famil 


iarity  with,  i.  20;  its  early  seclusion, 
88;  more  than  a  geographical  divi 
sion,  ii.  80  ;  what  it  stood  for  with 
J.  R.  L.,  80  ;  Puritanism  in,  82. 

New  England  Two  Centuries  Ago, 
referred  to,n.  71;  contributed  to 
North  American,  79  ;  quoted,  81. 

"  New  Portfolio,  The,"  i.  413  and  note. 

Newspapers,  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii.  307. 

"New  Timon,  The,"  reviewed  by  J. 
R.  L.,  i.  290. 

Nichols,  George,  living  in  Judge  Lee's 
house,  i.  3  ;  his  work  on  the  Atlan 
tic,  444  ;  referred  to  by  J.  R.  L.  in 
an  article,  ii.  400. 

Nightingale  in  the  Study,  The,  i.  269 ; 
ii.  115. 

Nightwatches,  ii.  324. 

Nominations  for  the  Presidency,  The, 
i.  213. 

Nooning,  The,  proposed  by  J.  R.  L.,  i. 
300 ;  its  contents,  301  ;  described 
further,  302;  wanted  for  a  serial, 
351;  resumed,  ii.  104. 

Nordhoff,  Charles,  J.  R.  L.  writes  to, 
on  the  political  situation,  ii.  19. 

Norris,  W.  E.,  a  novelist  liked  by  J. 
R.  L.,  ii.  407. 

North  American  Review,  J.  R.  L.'s 
contributions  to,  in  his  earlier 
period,  i.  290-293;  discusses  the 
Hungarian  question,  303;  J.  R.  L. 
takes  the  editorship  of,  ii.  45  ;  its 
change  of  [character,  46 ;  J.  R.  L. 
characterizes  it  under  the  old  re 
gime,  48 ;  J.  R.  L.  's  political  papers 
in,  49;  letter  to  publishers  of,  by 
Lincoln,  51,  note.  . 

Northampton,  a  limit  of  Dr.  Lowell's 
chaise  tours,  i.  20. 

Norton,  Charles  Eliot,  his  Letters  of 
James  Russell  Lowell  referred  to,  i. 
39,  60,  88,  200,  233,  237,  242,  296, 
427,  435,  443,  444,  453 ;  ii.  19,  33,  40, 
44,  48,  65,  67,  116,  139, 140, 176, 193, 
202,  204,  218,  219,  227,  262,  356. 

Letter  to,  from  J.  R.  L.  on  village 
music,  i.  25 ;  letter  to,  from  J.  R.  L. 
on  Jefferson,  218,  note ;  on  change 
in  title-page  of  A  Fable  for  Critics, 
249,  note  ;  entertains  Clough  and 
others,  346 ;  edits  Donne's  poems, 
365;  letter  of  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  his  life 
on  the  North  Shore,  366  ;  letter  of 
J.  R.  L.  to,  inviting  him  to  hear  him 


INDEX 


475 


lecture,  370;  on  Chartres,  380;  on 
his  life  in  Dresden,  382 ;  meets  J. 
R.  L.  at  Orvieto,  384 ;  J.  R.  L.  to, 
on  his  love  of  the  country,  385 ;  his 
"New  Life  "  of  Dante,  given  by  J. 
R.  L.  to  his  class,  393 ;  letters  to, 
from  J.  R.  L.  concerning  Miss  Dun- 
lap,  401,  402  ;  on  editorial  worries, 
429  ;  on  his  desire  for  relief,  443, 
444  ;  on  the  sale  of  the  Atlantic,  451. 
Associated  with  J.  R.  L.  in  edi 
torship  of  the  North  American,  ii. 
45 ;  J.  R.  L.  writes  a  rhymed  let 
ter  to,  on  the  announcement,  47; 
an,d  of  his  own  delinquency,  49;  and 
in  doubt  of  Lincoln,  55 ;  and  in  ex 
ultation,  60 ;  J.  R.  L.  writes  to,  on 
college  work,  76  ;  gives  an  account 
of  the  Dante  Club  meetings,  84  ;  J. 
R.  L.  writes  to,  of  Cranch  and  the 
weather  and  his  own  personality, 
95  ;  edits  Donne  with  Mrs.  Burnett, 
102,  note  ;  J.  R.  L.  writes  to,  of  his 
own  likeness  to  Leasing,  110;  writes, 
with  J.  R.  L.,  a  review  of  Longfel 
low's  "Dante,"  113;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on 
Voyage  to  Vinland,  120  ;  letters  to, 
from  J.  R.  L.  during  third  journey 
in  Europe,  154-164,  168,  170,  173- 
180 ;  in  Paris,  where  J.  R.  L.  joins 
him,  158;  leaves  for  London,  159; 
sends  the  Emersons  to  J.  R.  L.,  161 ; 
returns  to  America,  168;  criticises 
Agassiz,  177;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  leav 
ing  America  for  Spain,  220 ;  pre 
sides  at  dinner  of  Tavern  Club,  387. 

Norton,  Miss  Grace,  J.  R.  L.  to,  on 
Chester,  ii.  153;  on  Hayes,  219. 

Norton,  Miss  Jane,  letter  of  J.  R.  L. 
to,  on  Beverly  woods,  i.  365;  on 
lecturing  in  the  West,  378 ;  on  let 
ter-writing,  445;  J.  R.  L.  writes  a 
palsied-hand  letter  to,  ii.  38  ;  J.  R. 
L.  writes  to,  on  Commemoration 
Ode,  63  ;  also  on  "Miles  Standish," 
75;  and  on  his  collegiate  work,  76; 
and  on  the  museum  at  Naples,  180. 

Nurnberg,  ii.  170. 

Ode  for  the  Fourth  of  July,  1876,  An, 
ii.  190. 

Ode  read  at  Cambridge  on  the  Hun 
dredth  Anniversary  of  Washington's 
Taking  Command  of  the  American 
Army,  ii.  189. 


Ode  read  at  the  One  Hundredth  Anni 
versary  of  the  Fight  at  Concord 
Bridge,  ii.^189. 

Ode  to  France^..  204. 

Ode  to  Happiness,  i.  368,  434. 

"Old  Cambridge,"  by  T.  W.  Higgin- 
son,  referred  to  on  J.  R.  L.'s  sus 
pension,  i.  47 ;  on  Underwood's 
magazine,  354,  note. 

Old  Dramatists,  J.  R.  L.'s  first  studies 
in  the,  i.  98 ;  subject  of,  treated  in 
lectures  in  1887,  133  ;  treated  of  in 
Conversations^^  ',  and  in  articles 
in  Atlantic  and  North  American,  ii. 
77;  a  volume  of,  edited  by  J.  R.  L., 
78,  note  ;  lectures  on,  by  J.  R.  L.  in 
1887,  352. 

Old  Road  in  Cambridge,  i.  2. 

Oliver,  Thomas,  lieutenant-governor 
of  the  Province,  builds  the  Elmwood 
house,  i.  4;  hastily  leaves  it,  5. 

On  my  twenty-fourth  Birthday,  i.  125. 

On  the  Capture  of  Fugitive  Slaves  near 
Washington,  i.  174  ;  ii.  137,  note. 

Origin  of  Didactic  Poetry,  The,  i.  418. 

Oriole's  Nest,  The ;  see  Nest,  The. 

Orkney  Isles,  ancestral  home  of  J.  R. 
L.'s  mother,  i.  11. 

O'Sullivan,  John,  editor  of  Democratic 
Review,  i.  Ill  ;  J.  R.  L.  writes  to, 
about  Hawthorne,  283. 

Otis,  Harrison  Gray,  action  of,  gives 
rise  to  two  of  J.  R.  L.'s  poems,  i. 
258-260. 

Our  Literature,  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii.  390. 

Our  Own,  published  in  Putnam's 
Monthly,  i.  351;  its  failure,  352; 
parts  of,  saved,  353. 

"  Our  Whispering  Gallery,"  ii.  149. 

Our  Young  Folks,  J.  R.  L.  writes  for, 
ii.  105. 

Owen,  John,  publishes  Conversations, 
i.  132;  reports  success  of  the  book, 
153  ;  wishes  to  suppress  one  of  J. 
R.  L.'s  anti-slavery  poems,  184. 

Oxford,  J.  R.  L.  goes  to,  for  his  de 
gree,  ii.  169,  170  ;  professorship  at, 
proposed  for  J.  R.  L.,  318. 

Page,  William,  J.  R.  L.  meets,  i.  78 ; 
paints  M.  W.'s  portrait,  79 ;  J.  R. 
L.'s  affection  for,  116;  likened  to 
Haydon,  117  ;  paints  J.  R.  L.'s  por 
trait,  117;  is  shown  a  bit  of  A 
Fable  for  Critics,  240  ;  proposed  as 


476 


INDEX 


a  beneficiary  of  the  book,  241 ;  has 
faith  in  the  book,  242  ;  paints  Bry 
ant's  portrait,  245,  note;  with 
Briggs  and  Willis  discusses  J.  R.  L. 
and  Poe,  282  ;  meets  J.  R.  L.  in 
Florence,  314  ;  dines  with  him  there, 
315 ;  meets  him  at  Orvieto,  384. 

Palfrey,  John  Gorham,  his  "  History 
of  New  England"  reviewed  by  J. 
R.  L.,  ii.  79. 

Palmer,  George  Herbert,  ii.  340. 

Parable,  A,  i.  228. 

Parker,  Captain  Montgomery,  letter 
to,  in  China  from  J.  R.  L.,  i.  438. 

Parker,  Friend,  with  whom  the 
Whites  and  Lowells  stayed  in  Phila 
delphia,  i.  151,  152. 

Parker,  Theodore,  editor  of  Massa 
chusetts  Quarterly,  i.  287;  letter  of 
J.  R.  L.  to,  288  ;  characterized  by 
J.  R.  L.,  290,  note. 

Parkman,  Francis,  J.  R.  L.  writes  on, 
ii.  398. 

Parnell,  Charles  Stewart,  prosecution 
of,  ii.  278;  his  extraordinary  char 
acterization  of  Irish- Americans,  281. 

Parsons,  Thomas  William,  contributor 
to  the  Pioneer,  i.  105 ;  J.  R.  L.  to, 
on  A  June  Idyll,  ii.  117. 

Peabody,  Andrew  Preston,  editor  of 
the  North  American,  ii.  45. 

Peirce,  Benjamin,  professor  of  mathe 
matics  at  Harvard  in  J.  R.  L.'s 
youth,  i.  37. 

Pellico,  Silvio,  i.  341. 

Pennsylvania  Academy  of  Fine  Arts, 
exhibition  of,  noticed  by  J.  R.  L.,  i. 
160,  161. 

Pennsylvania  Freeman,  J.  R.  L.  en 
gaged  to  write  for,  i.  152,  154 ;  his 
contributions  to  the  paper,  169-173  ; 
Letter  from  Boston  sent  to,  181. 

Pepperell,  Massachusetts,  i.  274. 

Perceval,  Hugh,  a  nom  de  plume  of 
J.  R.L.,  i.  92,161. 

Percival,  James  Gates,  J.  R.  L.  on, 
ii.  109. 

Perry,  Mrs.  Lilla  Cabot,  J.  R.  L.  to, 
on  Spenser,  ii.  188. 

Peterboro,  ii.  156. 

Petrarch  and  Michelangelo  compared, 
ii.  111. 

Phillips,  Moses  Dresser,  i.  409  ;  won 
over  to  the  scheme  of  a  magazine, 
410;  gives  a  little  dinner,  410; 


interests  Mrs.  Stowe,  412;  dies, 
449. 

Phillips,  Wendell,  contributor  to  the 
Standard,  i.  193 ;  his  eloquence 
contrasted  with  that  of  the  Charles 
ton  batteries,  ii.  26. 

Phillips  &  Sampson  undertake  the 
Atlantic  Monthly,  i.  408  ;  character 
of  the  house,  420  ;  J.  R.  L.'s  duty 
toward,  426  ;  failure  of,  450. 

Phcebe,  ii.  295. 

Pickens-and-Stealins"1  Rebellion,  The, 
ii.  25. 

Pictures  from  Appledore,  i.  302,  367. 

Pioneer,  The,  projected  byT.  R.  L. 
and  R.  Carter,  i.  99 ;  prospectus  of, 
99,  100  ;  its  purpose,  10Lf-i»*roduc- 
tion  to,  103-105  ;  its  contributors, 
105 ;  its  contents,  105  ;  carried  on  in 
absence  of  J.  R.  L.,  106  ;  suspended, 
107  ;  how  it  looked  in  New  York, 
109;  J.  R.  L.'s  concern  for,  110- 
113;  J.  R.  L.'s  formal  bow  in,  ii. 
390. 

Pipe,  the,  as  a  weather-sign,  ii.  358. 

"  Pirate,  The,"  i.  11. 

Place  of  the  Independent  in  Politics, 
The  ;  see  Independent  in  Politics. 

Plays  of  Thomas  Middleton,  The, 
extract  from,  on  poets,  i.  149. 

Pocket  Celebration  of  the  Fourth,  The, 
ii.  14,  note. 

Poe,  Edgar  Allan,  contributor  to  The 
Pioneer,  i.  105 ;  rate  of  payment 
to,  by  Broadway  Journal,  158; 
sketched  by  J.  R.  L.  in  Graham's 
Magazine,  162  ;  his  criticism  of 
J.  R.  L.,  163  ;  his  allusions  to  Long 
fellow's  family,  164;  J.  R.  L.'s 
judgment  of,  165-167  ;  the  corre 
spondence  with  J.  R.  L.,  165,  note; 
his  relation  with  J.  R.  L.  discussed 
by  Briggs,  Willis,  and  Page,  382. 

Poems,  J.  R.L.  preparing  the  volume 
of,  i.  239. 

Poems,  second  series  by  J.  R.  L. 
issued,  i.  277  ;  analyzed,  277-280. 

Poetry,  J.  R.  L.'s  enquiry  into,  in 
Conversations,  i.  137  ;  his  lectures 
on,  at  Lowell  Institute,  373-375. 

"Poet's  Yorkshire  Haunts,  A," 
quoted,  ii.  356. 

Political  Essays,  articles  not  included 
by  J.  R.  L.  in  his,  ii.  5  ;  published, 
372. 


INDEX 


477 


Pontine  marshes,  the,  i.  344. 

Pope,  the,  J.  R.  L.  sees,  i.  324  ;  hears 
him  celebrate  mass,  325  ;  likens  him 
to  an  American  statesman,  326. 

Pope,  Alexander,  criticised  by  J.  R.  L., 
i.  290  ;  treated  at  length  in  lectures 
on  poetry,  374. 

Portsmouth,  early  visited  by  J.  R.  L., 
i.  19,  20. 

Postmaster  at  Stockbridge,  account 
of,  by  J.  R.  L.,  i.  272. 

Power  of  Sound,  The,  quoted,  i.  20. 

Prescott,  Harriet  Elizabeth,  J.  R.  L. 
meets  at  dinner,  i.  449. 

Prescott,  William  Hickling,  his  "  Con 
quest  of  Mexico,"  i.  274 ;  impor 
tance  of,  to  the  Atlantic,  420. 

Presepio  on  Christmas  eve  in  Rome, 
i.  324,  325. 

President  on  the  Stump,  The^u.  93, 

"President's  Message,  The,"  by  Parke 
Godwin,  ii.  3. 

Proctor,  Mrs.  Bryan  Waller,  ii.  335. 

Professorship  at  Oxford  proposed  for 
J.  R.  L.,  ii.  318. 

Prometheus,  i.  115;  at  work  on,  119; 
its  character,  121";  compared  with 
Keats's  "Hyperion,"  122;  Briggs 
and  J.  R.  L.  on,  123. 

Proof-reading,  J.  R.  L.  on,  i.  444. 

Provincial  Newspaper  Society,  J.  R.  L. 
before,  ii.  306. 

Punch  on  J.  R.  L.  as  an  alien,  ii.  300. 

Puritanism  in  New  England,  ii.  82. 

Putnam,  George,  J.  R.  L.  to,  ii.  182, 
296. 

Putnam,  George  Palmer,  to  publish  A 
Fable  for  Critics,  i.  242;  does  not 
notice  the  rhymed  title-page,  249, 
note  ;  his  character  as  a  publisher, 
349. 

Putnam,  Mrs.  S.  R.,  see  Lowell,  Mary 
Traill  Spence. 

Putnam,  William  Lowell,  killed  at 
Ball's  Bluff,  ii.  30. 

Putnam's  Monthly,  established,  i. 
348  ;  prospectus  of,  349  ;  its  decline, 
350. 

Puttenham's  "  Art  of  English  Poesie," 
i.  67. 

Question  of  the  Hour,  The,  ii.  20. 

Quincy,  Edmund,  writes  the  life  of 
his  father,  Josiah  Quincy,  i.  27  ;  one 
of  the  editors  of  the  Standard,  192 ; 


a  contributor  to  the  same,  193; 
corresponding  editor  of,  202  ;  the 
quality  of  his  work,  211  ;  valued  by 
J.  R.  L.,  230,  231;  "correspond 
ence  "  with  J.  R.  L.,  235  ;  writes 
for  Atlantic,  ii.  2. 

Quincy,  Josiah,  president  of  Harvard, 
i.  27  ;  portrayed  by  J.  R.  L.,  27,  28. 

Rebellion,  The ;  its  Causes  and  Con 
sequences,  ii.  53.^ 

Rebellion  Record,  The,  reviewed  by 
J.  R.  L.,  ii.  61. 

Reconstruction  ^\\.^1. 

Reed,  Dwight,  secretary  of  J.  R.  L.  at 
Madrid,  ii.  251 ;  his  constant  ser 
vice,  252. 

Religion,  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii.  310. 

Reviewing,  evolution  of,  i.  430;  dia- 
likedby  J.  R.  L.,  433. 

Rheims,  ii.  170. 

Rhett,  Robert,  ii.  24. 

Rhcecus,  i.  120. 

Riano,  Don  Juan  and  Doiia  Emilia  de, 
faithful  friends  of  Mrs.  Lowell  in 
her  sickness,  ii.  252. 

Riedesel,  Baroness,  a  resident  of 
Cambridge,  quoted  on  Tory  Row, 
i.  3. 

"  Rimini  and  other  Poems,  by  Leigh 
Hunt,"  i.  250. 

Ripon,  ii.  154,  156. 

Riverside  Press,  The,  i.  421 ;  J.  R.  L.'s 
walk  to,  444. 

Rogers,  Samuel,  J.  R.  L.  indebted  to, 
ii.  177. 

Rolker,  Bernard,  sings  a  song,  i.  379. 

Rome,  J.  R.  L.'s  entrance  into,  i. 
318  ;  life  at,  320  ;  early  impressions 
of,  321 ;  Christmas  at,  323 ;  art  in, 
327;  people  in,  328;  revision  of 
.judgment  concerning,  330 ;  social 
life  in,  331 ;  illumination  of  St. 
Peter's  at,  339  ;  final  impressions  of, 
342. 

Rossetti,  Dante  Gabriel,  i.  375. 

"  Round  Table,  The,"  i.  431. 

Rousseau,  article  on,  compared  with 
lecture  on,  ii.  Ill ;  suggests  the 
subject  of  the  Jews  to  J.  R.  L., 
301. 

Rowfant  Club,  the,  prints  J.  R.  L.'s 
lectures  on  poetry,  i.  373. 

Rowse,  Samuel  W.,  hears  Commemo- 
ration  Ode,  ii.  64 ;  a  guest  ol 


478 


INDEX 


J.  R.  L.,  82 ;  missed  by  J.  R.  L., 

157,  161. 

Royce,  Josiah,  ii.  67,  note. 
Ruskin,  John,  J.  R.   L.  advises  work- 

ingmen  to  read  his  books,   ii.  86  ; 

praises     The     Cathedral,    140 ;    on 

Turner's  "  Old  Te"m6raire,"  369. 

Sacred  Parasol,  The,  i.  209. 

St.  Andrews,  J.  R.  L.  proposed  for 
the  rectorship  of,  ii.  299  ;  students 
of,  addressed  by  J.  R.  L.,  301. 

St.  Angelo,  bridge  of,  i.  319  ;  J.  R.  L. 
sees  illumination  from,  340. 

Sainte-Beuve,  Charles  Augustin,  sends 
the  Atlantic  a  paper  on  Bdranger,  ii. 
77. 

St.  Ives,  a  resort  for  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  356. 

St.  Peter's  in  Rome,  J.  R.  L.  com 
ments  on  size  of,  i.  321  ;  the  Pope 
celebrates  mass  at,  325 ;  illumina 
tion  of,  339. 

Sales,  Francis,  instructor  in  French 
and  Spanish  at  Harvard  in  J.  R.  L.'s 
youth,  i.  27. 

Sample  of  Consistency,  A ,  ii.  14,  note. 

Sampson,  Charles,  i.  409. 

San  Luigi  dei  Francesi,  midnight  mass 
at  the  church  of,  i.  323,  325. 

Santa  Maria  Maggiore,  illumination  at 
church  of,  i.  323,  324. 

Saturday  Club,  The,  i.  447. 

Sawin,  Birdofredom,  character  of,  i. 
265. 

Scates,  Charles  Woodman,  i.  45,  53. 

Schooling,  J.  R.  L.'s  early,  i.  21. 

Scotch  the  Snake,  or  kill  it  ?  ii.  61. 

Scotland,  relations  of,  with  England, 
ii.  276. 

Scott,  Sir  Walter,  early  read  by 
J.  R.  L.,  i.  24  ;  Lockhart's  Life  of, 
read  by  J.  R.  L.,  46  ;  his  diary  read 
by  J.  R.  L.  in  the  last  days,  ii.  407. 

Sedgwick,  Catherine,  the  tales  of,  i. 
88. 

Self-possession  vs.  Prepossession,  ii. 
27. 

Seminoles,  J.  R.  L. 's  early  interest  in, 
i.  37. 

Service  for  the  Dead,  J.  R.  L.  repeats 
the,  i.  362. 

Sewall,  Jonathan,  i.  3. 

Seward,  William  Henry,  preferred  by 
J.  R.  L.  for  the  presidency,  ii.  18. 

Seward-Johnson  Reaction,  The,  ii.  107. 


Shackford,  William  Henry,  a  college 
friend  of  J.  R.  L.,  i.  33;  goes  to 
teach  at  Phillips  Exeter  Academy, 
33;  his  relation  to  J.  R.  L.,  34; 
letters  of  J.  R.  L.  to,  34-38. 

Shady  Hill,  home  of  the  Norton  fam 
ily,  i.  446. 

Shakespeare,  an  early  acquaintance 
of  J.  R.  L.,  i.  15  ;  read  by  him  in 
college,  37  ;  White's  edition  of,  re 
viewed  by  J.  R.  L.,  432,  433 ;  lectured 
on  and  written  about  by  J.  R.  L. ,  ii. 
77. 

Shakespeare  Once  More,  quoted,  j.. 
388;  ii.  87. 

Shakespeare's  Richard  III.,  ii.  351. 

Shaw,  Frank,  i.  314. 

Shaw,  Robert  Gould,  J.  R.  L.  com 
memorates  in  a  poem,  ii.  42  ;  honors 
in  a  letter  to  his  mother,  43. 

Shelley,  Percy  Bysshe,  J.  R.  L.  intro 
duced  to  the  writings  of,  i.  32  ;  his 
genius  likened  to  St.  Elmo's  fire,138 ; 
the  shell  of,  375. 

Shepherd  of  King  Admetus,  The,  i.  147. 

Sicily,  J.  R.  L.  visits  and  character 
izes,  i.  384. 

Sidney's  "Defense  of  Poesie,"  i.  67. 

"  Simple  Cobbler  of  Agawam,"  ii. 
367. 

Sirens,  The,  i.  85. 

"  Sir  Galahad  "  suggests  Sir  Launfal, 
i.  268. 

"  Skipper  Ireson's  Ride,"  by  Whittier, 
J.  R.  L.  on,  i.  417,  418. 

"  Slave  Mother,  The,"  verses  by  M. 
W.  L.,  i.  180. 

Sleeplessness,  J.  R.  L.'s  cure  for,  ii. 
383. 

Slick,  Sam,  i.  261. 

Smalley,  George  W.,  on  J.  R.  L.'s 
Americanism,  ii.  262. 

Smith  Professorship,  Longfellow  re 
signs,  i.  375 ;  and  it  is  given  to 
J.  R.  L.,  376 ;  afterwards  emeritus, 
ii.  322. 

Smith,  Sydney,  on  Daniel  Webster,  i. 
221  ;  his  scornful  question,  ii.  363. 

Socialism,  ii.  315,  349. 

"  Solitude  and  Society"  by  Emerson, 
J.  R.  L.  on,  i.  416. 

Song  sung  at  an  Anti-Slavery  Picnic, 
J.  Owen  wishes  to  suppress,  i.  184. 

Sonnet,  J.  R.  L.  on  the,  as  seen  in 
Longfellow's  writing,  ii.  306. 


INDEX 


479 


Sophocles,  the  Philoctetes  of,  ii.  404. 

Southborough,  ii.  322. 

"Southern  History  of  the  War"  re 
viewed  by  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  53. 

Southern  Literary  Messenger,  a  ve 
hicle  for  J.  R.  L.'s  work,  i.  92. 

Sower,  The,  i.  228. 

Spanish,  J.  R.  L.  studies,  ii.  76  ;  a 
familiar  tongue  to  him  when  he  went 
to  Madrid,  221 ;  how  J.  R.  L.  worked 
at  it,  241,  242. 

Spectator,  London,  on  J.  R.  L.  and 
Lord  Granville,  ii.  291. 

Spence,  Keith,  maternal  grandfather 
of  J.  R.  L.,  i.  11. 

Spence,  Mary  Traill,  J.  R.  L.'s  loyal 
ist  grandmother,  i.  11,  note. 

Spens,  Sir  Patrick,  a  poetic  forbear 
of  J.  R.  L.,  i.  11. 

Spenser,  Edmund,  earliest  of  J.  R.  L.'s 
poets,  i.  14,  and  note ;  imitated  by 
J.  R.  L.,  351 ;  essay  on,  by  J.  R.  L., 
ii.  188. 

Squirrels,  J.  R.  L.'s  care  for,  ii.  407. 

Stanley,  Henry  Morton,  ii.  296. 

Stedman,  Edmund  Clarence,  J.  R.  L. 
to,  on  modern  antiques,  ii.  93. 

Stephen,  Leslie,  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  Car- 
lyle,  ii.  89  ;  his  description  of  J.  R. 
L.  quoted,  115;  J.  R.  L.  comments 
on  his  "  Are  we  Christians  ?  "  165 ; 
and  his  "  Essays  on  Free  Thinking 
and  Plain  Speaking,"  175,  176 ;  J. 
R.  L.  to,  on  politics,  202 ;  resorts  to 
St.  Ives,  356 ;  visits  Elmwood,  398. 

Stewart,  Dugald,  a  teacher  of  Charles 
Lowell,  i.  7. 

Stillman,  William  James,  starts  The 
Crayon,  i.  367;  inspirits  J.  R.  L., 
367  ;  J.  R.  L.  sends  a  poem  to  his 
paper,  378 ;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on  the  dry 
ing  up  of  the  poetic  fount,  400  ;  his 
estimate  of  Miss  Dunlap,  402 ;  forms 
the  Adirondack  Club,  404;  charac 
terizes  J.  R.  L.  in  the  woods,  405  ; 
and  in  his  married  life,  406  ;  dinner 
given  to,  448;  on  J.  R.  L.'s  care  of 
his  squirrels,  ii.  407. 

Stockbridge,  Massachusetts,  visited 
by  J.  R.  L.  and  family,  i.  272. 

Stone,  Thomas  Treadwell,  contributor 
to  the  Standard,  i.  193. 

Story,  William  Wetmore,  an  early 
friend  and  playmate  of  J.  R.  L.,  i. 
22;  contributor  to  the  Pioneer, 


105 ;  J.  R.  L.  meets  him  in  Rome, 
320;  hunts  for  a  lion's  skin,  333; 
goes  with  J.  R.  L.  to  Subiaco,  343 ; 
hears  Commemoration  Ode  read, 
ii.  64  ;  J.  R.  L.  on  his  works,  86; 
at  Crosby  Lodge  on  Eden,  154 ; 
visited  by  J.  R.  L.,  156;  entertains 
J.  R.  L.  in  Rome,  179 ;  J.  R.  L.  on 
his  statues,  179;  J.  R.  L.  to,  on 
Mrs.  Lowell's  death,  320. 

Stowe,  Harriet  Beecher,  relied  on  to 
float  a  magazine,  i.  354  ;  her  books 
published  by  Phillips  &  Sampson, 
409;  interested  in  the  Atlantic  by 
Mr.  Phillips,  412  ;  her  importance, 
420  ;  her  "  Minister's  Wooing  "  criti 
cised  by  J.  R.  L.,  430  ;  and  reviewed 
by  him,  449. 

Stubbs,  Charles  William,  Canon,  later 
Dean,  on  J.  R.  L.'s  cure  for  sleep 
lessness,  ii.  382. 

Sumner,  Charles,  characterizes  J.  R. 
L.'s  lecture  on  Milton,  i.  373. 

Sunthin'1  in  the  Pastoral  Line,  i.  269 ; 
ii.  41. 

Swift,  Jonathan,  J.  R.  L.  writes  on, 
ii.  198. 

Swinburne's  Tragedies,  reviewed  by 
J.  R.  L.,i.  374;  ii.  92. 

"  Tales  of  a  Grandfather,"  one  of  J. 

R.  L.'s  first  books,  i.  25. 
"Tancred"  reviewed  by  J.  R.  L.,   i. 

290. 

Tarifa,  Spanish  town  of,  i.  313. 
Tavern  Club  gives  J.  R.  L.  a  dinner 

on  his  seventieth  birthday,  ii.  387. 
Taylor,  Jeremy,  on  the  Countess  of 

Carbery,  i.  361. 
Taylor,   Zachary,   nominated  for  the 

presidency,  i.  220. 
Tempora  Mutantur,  ii.  191. 
Tennant,  Miss  Dorothy,  ii.  296. 
Tennyson,  Alfred,  J.  R.  L.'s  early  in 
terest  in  the  poems  of,   i.  94,  96; 

Arthurian     legends    of,    compared 

with  Sir  Launfal,  268 ;    influence 

of,  on  J.   R.   L.,   ii.  88 ;   J.   R.   L. 

lunches  with,  261. 
Terracina,  J.  R.  L.  at,  i.  343. 
Texas,  debate  on,  i.  167  ;  verses  on,  by 

J.  R.  L.,  168. 
Thackeray,  William  Makepeace,  J.  R. 

L.   comments  on,  i.  297  ;  J.  R.  L. 

makes  the  acquaintance  of,  346. 


480 


INDEX 


Thaxter,  Levi  Lincoln,  on  J.  R.  L.'s 
letter  to  M.  W.,  i.  89,  note. 

Thayer,  James  Bradley,  J.  R.  L.  to, 
on  The  Nooning,  i.  302  ;  J.  R.  L.  to, 
011  the  measure  of  his  odes,  ii.  44, 
note  ;  and  on  the  Commemoration 
Ode,  65,  67. 

Theatricals,  private,  in  Rome,  J.  R.  L. 
takes  part  in,  i.  331 ;  writes  pro 
logues  for,  332-334. 

Thoreau,  Henry  David,  reviewed  by 
J.  R.  L.  in  Massachusetts  Quarterly, 
i.  292  ;  wanted  by  J.  R.  L.  as  con 
tributor  to  the  Atlantic,  415,  417. 

Ticknor,  William  D.,  character  of,  as 
publisher,  i.  451. 

Ticknor  &  Fields  buy  the  Atlantic, 
i.  451. 

Tilden,  Samuel  Jones,  J.  R.  L.  urged 
to  vote  for,  ii.  216. 

Times,  London,  quoted,  ii.  318. 

Titian,  the  "  Sacred  and  Profane 
Love  "of,  i.  327,  328,  note;  poem 
suggested  by,  ii.  371. 

Token,  The,  i.  146. 

Toombs,  Robert,  ii.  24. 

Tory  Row,  Cambridge,  i.  2  ;  the  houses 
on  it,  2-4. 

To  the  Muse,  i.  406. 

Tours,  Mrs.  Lowell  plans  to  stay  at, 
ii.  249. 

Traill,  Robert,  great-grandfather  of 
J.  R.  L.,i.  11. 

Trattoria,  a,  in  Florence,  i.  315. 

Tribune,  The  New  York,  on  J.  R.  L. 
in  1843,  i.  117  ;  in  1882,  ii.  289. 

"Tritemius,"  by  Whittier,  J.  R.  L. 
on,  i.  418. 

Troil,  Minna,  of  "The  Pirate,"  literary 
forbear  of  J.  R.  L.,  i.  11. 

Trollope,  Anthony,  J.  R.  L.  dines 
with,  ii.  82. 

Trowbridge,  John  Townsend,  on  Emer 
son's  "Brahma,"  i.  415. 

"Trueman,  Matthew,  Letter  to,"  i. 
158,  159. 

"  Two  Angels,  The,"  Longfellow's 
poem,  i.  362. 

Turner's  Old  Tem&raire,  ii.  368,  369. 

Two  Scenes  from  the  Life  of  Blondel, 
ii.  43. 

Uncle  Cobus's  Story,  ii.  106. 
«'  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin,"  published  by 
J.  P.  Jewett,  success  of,  suggests  a 


magazine,  i.  354;  declined  by 
Phillips  &  Sampson  when  offered  to 
them,  409. 

Under  the  Old  Elm,  ii.  189. 

Under  the  Willows,  i.  268;  title 
chosen  for  volume ,  ii.  119  ;  brings 
congratulatory  letters,  125. 

Underwood,  Francis  Henry,  projects 
a  magazine,  i.  354 ;  receives  for  it  a 
poem  from  J.  R.  L. ,  354  ;  letter  to, 
from  J.  R.  L.  on  failure  of  maga 
zine,  355 ;  proposes  the  Atlantic 
408;  secures  the  aid  of  J.  R.  L. 
and  others,  409  ;  wins  over  Phillips 
&  Sampson,  410  ;  dines  with  pub 
lisher,  editor  and  chief  contributors, 
411  ;  goes  to  England  for  the  maga 
zine,  412  ;  is  J.  R.  L.'s  right-hand 
man,  414 ;  attends  to  correspond 
ence,  428. 

Union  League  Club  in  Chicago,  ii. 
352. 

Valedictories,  J.  R.  L.'s,  ii.  373. 

Van  Buren,  Martin,  nominated  for 
the  presidency,  i.  224. 

"Vanity  Fair,"  J.  R.  L.  on,  i.  297. 

Vassall,  Henry,  i.  2. 

Vassall,  Colonel  John,  his  house  in 
Cambridge  the  headquarters  of 
"Washington  and  home  of  Longfel 
low,  i.  3. 

Vaughan,  Henry,  quoted,  ii.  99. 

Venice,  J.  R.  L.'s  delight  in,  ii.  171 ; 
his  return  thither,  272. 

Very,  Jones,  contributor  to  the 
Pioneer,  i.  105. 

"Virginian  in  New  England,  Thirty- 
five  Years  ago,  A,"  ii.  136. 

Vision  of  Sir  Launfal,  The,  i.  266; 
the  brook  in,  267  ;  compared  with 
Tennyson's  romances,  268  ;  June 
in,  268. 

Voyage  to  Vinland,  called  also  Leifs 
Voyage,  i.  301 ;  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii.  120. 

Wales,  Henry  Ware,  J.  R.  L.'s  tri 
bute  to,  ii.  403-406. 

Walker,  James,  president  of  Harvard 
College,  i.  376;  urges  J.  R.  L.  to 
attend  Faculty  meetings,  395. 

Walton,  Isaak,  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii.  389. 

"Wanderer,"  yacht,  i.  440. 

Ward,  Nathaniel,  ii.  367. 

Washers  of  the  Shroud,  The,  ii.  33. 


INDEX 


481 


Washington,  early  visit  of  J.  R.  L.  to, 
i.  19. 

"Washington,  George,  takes  command 
of  American  army,  i.  2 ;  his  head 
quarters,  3. 

Watertown,  Massachusetts,  the  home 
of  the  Whites,  i.  76 ;  temperance 
celebration  at,  88. 

Watts-Dunton,  Theodore,  on  J.  R.  L.'s 
characteristics,  ii.  293. 

Waverley  Oaks,  J.  R.  L.  's  early  ram 
bles  to,  i.  19. 

Webster,  Daniel,  J.  R.  L.  hears  him 
plead,  i.  67 ;  attitude  toward,  on 
part  of  anti-slavery  men,  201 ;  arti 
cle  on,  by  J.  R.  L.,  and  poem  on,  by 
Whittier,  201 ;  J.  R.  L.  treats  elab 
orately,  220-227;  characterized  by 
Sydney  Smith,  221 ;  as  a  writer,  ii. 
365. 

Webster,  John,  J.  R.  L.  on,  ii.  354. 

"Wedgwood's  Dictionary"  reviewed 
by  J.  R.  L.,i.  433. 

"  Week  on  the  Concord  and  Merrimack 
Rivers,  A,"  reviewed  by  J.  R.  L.,  i. 
292. 

Weimar,  J.  R.  L.  visits,  ii.  271. 

Weiss,  John,  contributor  to  the 
Standard,  i.  193. 

Wells,  William,  J.  R.  L.'s  schoolmas 
ter  living  in  Fayerweather  house,  i. 
3  ;  carries  forward  the  traditions  of 
English  scholarship,  22,  23. 

Wells,  Mrs.  William,  J.  R.  L.  recalls 
the  kindness  of,  i.  23. 

Welsh,  James,  ii.  332,  note. 

Wendell,  Barrett,  on  Lowell  as  a 
teacher,  i.  392,  394,  395. 

What  will  Mr.  Webster  do  ?  i.  220. 

"  Where  will  it  End  ?  "  by  Edmund 
Quincy,  ii.  2. 

Whipple,  Edwin  Percy,  i.  411. 

Whist  Club,  i.  271;  holds  its  last 
meeting,  ii.  407. 

Whitby,  J.  R.  L.'s  fondness  for,  ii. 
356. 

White,  Abijah,  father  of  M.  W.,  i. 
76;  characterized  by  J.  R.  L.,  76; 
death  of,  177  ;  his  estate,  177  ;  which 
proves  less  than  expected,  182. 

White,  Maria,  J.  R.  L.  makes  the  ac 
quaintance  of,  i.  76 ;  his  first  im 
pressions  of  her,  77  ;  her  portrait  by 
Page,  79  ;  appears  in  a  vision  to  J. 
R.  L. ,  80 ;  and  at  commencement, 


80  ;  her  confession  of  love,  82  ;  em 
bodied  in  A  Year's  Life,  82-86  ;  the 
type  to  which  she  belonged,  87  ; 
"  Queen  of  the  May  "  at  a  temper 
ance  festival,  88  ;  a  member  of  the 
Band,  89  ;  a  poet,  90 ;  encourages 
J.  R.  L.  to  print,  93  ;  her  attitude 
towards  the  Pioneer,  108;  charac 
terized  by  C.  F.  Briggs,  120 ;  her 
influence  over  J.  R.  L.,  121;  veiled 
under  poetic  names  in  poems,  126 ; 
her  transcendentalism,  129  ;  letter 
of,  to  C.  F.  Briggs,  129-132  ;  criti 
cises  title  of  Briggs's  journal,  130 ; 
her  views  on  the  marriage  rite,  131, 
132  ;  makes  a  cover  design  for  Con 
versations,  132  ;  is  married  to  J.  R. 
L.,  150.  See  Lowell,  Maria  White. 

White,  Richard  Grant,  goes  to  hear 
J.  R.  L.  lecture,  i.  373 ;  letter  to, 
from  J.  R.  L.  on  policy  of  the  At 
lantic,  423 ;  from  same  on  Ameri 
can  literary  criticism,  431 ;  his 
Shakespeare  reviewed  by  J.  R.  L., 
432  ;  letter  to,  from  J.  R.  L.  on  the 
worries  of  editing,  442 ;  on  the 
delights  of  Ehnwood,  453  ;  asks  for 
another  Biglow,  ii.  32 ;  J.  R.  L. 
writes  to,  about  his  own  work  on 
Shakespeare,  77  ;  dedicates  a  book 
to  J.  R.  L.,  146. 

White,  Thomas  W.,  editor  of  Southern 
Literary  Messenger,  i.  92. 

White,  William  Abijah,  brother  of 
M.  W.,  i.  76 ;  an  active  reformer, 
87  ;  prompts  Rolker,  379. 

Whitman,  Walt,  his  poem  "  My  Cap 
tain,"  ii.  70. 

Whittier,  John  Greenleaf ,  character 
ized  by  J.  R.  L.  in  the  Pioneer,  i. 
105  ;  compared  with  J.  R.  L.,  139 ; 
editor  of  Pennsylvania,  Freeman, 
152  ;  his  "  Ichabod  "  and  "  The  Lost 
Occasion,"  201 ;  his  poetry  reviewed 
by  J.  R.  L.,  229  ;  censured  by  Gay, 
229  ;  in  A  Fable  for  Critics,  254  ; 
his  indebtedness  to  the  Atlantic, 
417  ;  J.  R.  L.  to  him  on  "  Skipper 
Ireson's  Ride,"  417, 418  ;  his  rhymes 
criticised  by  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  103 ;  his 
title  conflicts  with  one  by  J.  R.  L., 
118;  J.  R.  L.  writes  a  sonnet  on  his 
birthday, 296;  his  "Captain's  Well," 
400. 

Widow's  Mite,  The,  ii.  206. 


482 


INDEX 


Wilbur,  Parson,  proposes  to  educate 
Hosea  Biglow,  i.  268;  another  Jede- 
diah  Cleishbotham,  262;  faintly 
hints  at  J.  R.  L.'s  father,  263  ;  in 
the  flesh,  263,  note  ;  as  seen  in  sec 
ond  series,  ii.  36  ;  his  voice  and  J. 
R.  L.'s,  37  ;  his  death  and  table-talk, 
38  :  his  views  on  the  war,  39. 

Wild,  Hamilton,  ii.  181. 

Wilkinson,  William  Cleaver,  criticism 
of,  on  J.  R.  L.,  ii.  197  and  note. 

Williams,  Frank  Beverly,  prepares 
notes  to  the  Biglow  Papers,  i.  256. 

Willis,  Nathaniel  Parker,  J.  R.  L. 
makes  the  acquaintance  of,  i.  Ill ; 
his  kindness  to  J.  R.  L.,  112  ;  in  A 
Fable  for  Critics,  243,  245 ;  com 
ments  on  J.  R.  L.'s  kindness  to 
Mrs.  Clemm,  282. 

Windharp,  The,  i.  368. 

Women,  J.  R.  L.'s  dependence  on,  ii. 
324. 

Wood,  Shakespeare,  i.  332. 


Woodberry,     George      Edward,     his 

"Edgar  Allan  Poe "    referred   to, 

i.   160  ;    edits  J.  R.  L.'s  letters  t* 

Poe,  165,  note. 
Woodman,  Horatio,  i.  405. 
"  Words  and  their  Uses,"  by  R.  G. 

White,  ii.  146. 
Wordsworth,    William,    politics    and 

poetry  of,  i.  236 ;    address  on,  by 

J.  R.  L.,  ii.  308. 
World's  Fair,    The,   ii.   191 ;   copied, 

192    J.  R.  L.'s  comments  on,  193. 
"World's  Progress,  The,"    J.  R.  L. 

writes  an  introduction  to,  ii.  344. 
"  Wuthering  Heights  "  commented  on 

by  J.  R.  L.,  i.  297. 
Wyman,  Jeffries,  i.  405. 
Wyman,  Dr.  Morrill,  ii.  402. 

Year's  Life,  A ,  a  poetic  recotd  of  J. 

R.  L.'s  experience,  i.  82. 
"Yesterdays  with  Authors,"  ii.  149, 

note. 


( 


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